Post World War II United Kingdom poster promoting vaccination against diphtheria.
Wow, look at the bonkers shape of Clostridium tetani, the organism responsible for tetanus! So weird.
This gram stain shows its “tennis racket” or “drumstick” appearance.
WHO airs concern about Middle East coronavirus transmission -
The World Health Organization (WHO) voiced increased concern today about the possibility of community transmission of the novel coronavirus, while sketching in a few more details about a hospital-centered case cluster in Saudi Arabia and the clinical spectrum of the infection.
Although sustained transmission in the community has not been seen, the WHO said, “The continued appearance of cases that are not part of larger clusters, and who do not have a history of animal contact, increases concerns about possible community transmission. This possibility is being investigated by authorities in Saudi Arabia.”
The WHO has confirmed 40 cases and 20 deaths from novel coronavirus infections since the pathogen was identified in 2012, most of them in older men.
Christ, this is the coolest thing ever.
“An artificial nano ‘T4 Bacteriophage’ made of diamond-like carbon that could be used as a viral robot to infect bacteria”
(via 2005 MicroGraph Winners)
Well, this is gross.
“We cannot wall ourselves off from the world and hope for the best, nor ignore the public health challenges beyond our borders. The world is interconnected, and that demands an integrated approach to global health.” — Barack Obama
Announcing the Winners of the Science Seeker Awards! -
So delighted and honored to have won Best Life-In-Science article from Science Seeker for my work on one of the earliest known HIV cases in a Norwegian sailor! Wonderful news!
Check out my article, “The Sea Has Neither Sense Nor Pity”!
The Next Contagion - Closer Than You Think - NYTimes.com -
Some seem to think that public health officials pull a microbe “crisis du jour” out of their proverbial test tube when financing for infectious disease research and control programs appears to be drying up. They dismiss warnings about the latest bugs as “crying wolf.” This misimpression could be deadly.
This poster, designed by René Gauch, offers a reward of $1000 to “the first person reporting an active smallpox case resulting from human to human transmission and confirmed by laboratory tests.” The reward was valid until the global eradication of smallpox was certified in 1980. Featuring an abstraction of a human face in a pointillist style, the symbolism in the design exhibits a haunting quality appropriate to the subject.
(via Visual Culture and Public Health Posters - Infectious Disease - Reward — Recompense $1000)
Plucking hell - your eyebrows are full of viruses -
HPV. In your eyebrows. Who knew?
Skeptically Speaking » #210 Spillover -
Great episode on the Canadian radio show, Skeptically Speaking.
“This week, we take a sobering look at infectious diseases in animals, and the scary things that happen when those infections spread to humans. Guest host Marie-Claire Shanahan talk to journalist David Quammen about his book Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic. And science journalist Maryn McKenna returns to give as an update on the H7N9 bird flu, and how it’s being reported by the media.”
Story of my life / #GPOY
Photograph of a poster issued by the Chinese government in the late 1970s depicting the spread of hookworm to humans by the use of human feces as fertilizer. A prevention method is also illustrated - wearing shoes.
The dapper, the deadly, ever the gentleman: King Cholera
Cartoon from 1832
“Epidemics have played an active role in the expansion of empires throughout history, as state-level societies introduce endemic childhood diseases into smaller and simpler societies, causing massive population losses and subsequent socioeconomic disorganization. The depopulation of North and South American Indians by epidemic infections brought from Europe by colonizers and from Africa by slaves [are] salient example[s].
Infectious diseases accelerated the conquest, subjugation and acculturation of tribes and chiefdoms.”
- MC Inhorn & PJ Brown. (1997) The Anthropology of Infectious Diseases. The Anthropology of Infectious Disease: International Health Perspectives Amsterdam: Gordon & Beach Publishers.