A New European Neglected Diseases Center for Greece?

Many of the same neglected diseases that cause a huge health impact on poor populations in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia also affect the impoverished populations living in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Now, following the downturn in the Greek economy, there is an opportunity to build a new Hellenic scientific institution for neglected infections of poverty located in the geographic center of these regions.

Epidemiologic Models, Key Logs, and Realizing the Promise of WHA 54.19

Commenting on the research article "How Effective is School-Based Deworming for the Community-Wide Control of Soil-Transmitted Helminths?," Dr. David Addiss addresses the matter of treating children for soil-transmitted helminths and the future goals of global STH control efforts.

Image source: Wikimedia Commons

How Effective is School-Based Deworming for the Community-Wide Control of Soil-Transmitted Helminths?

Large donations of drugs to treat soil-transmitted helminths (STH) means that many more school-aged children will be treated, improving their well-being and development. But will their treatment result in reductions in levels of infection for the whole community? In this paper Professor Sir Roy Anderson, et al. use mathematic models to explore the results of school-based STH treatment programs.

A Neglected Aspect of the Epidemiology of Sleeping Sickness: The Propensity of the Tsetse Fly Vector to Enter Houses

The tsetse fly can transmit the trypanosomes responsible for sleeping sickness, or human African trypanosomiasis, and in many locations eradication efforts have resulted in the insects seeking food or shelter in the artificial habitats of human dwellings. In their study, Dr. Glyn Vale, et al. examines the nature of houses as venues for the contact between humans and tsetse flies, and hence for the transmission of sleeping sickness.

Rabies in Iraq: Trends in Human Cases 2001-2010 and Characterisation of Animal Rabies Strains from Baghdad

Dr. Daniel Horton, et al. report on the state of rabies in Iraq, where a decade of conflict has created gaps in surveillance data for veterinary and public health authorities. With the help of local authorities, the researchers were able to characterize the genetic sequence of Iraq's prevalent rabies strain as having diverged from those found in neighboring countries approximately 22 years ago.