Infectious disease
hideAn infectious disease is a clinically evident disease resulting from the presence of pathogenic microbial agents, including pathogenic viruses, pathogenic bacteria, fungi, protozoa, multicellular parasites, and aberrant proteins known as prions. These pathogens are able to cause disease in animals and/or plants. Infectious pathologies are usually qualified as contagious diseases (also called communicable diseases) due to their potential of transmission from one person or species to another. Transmission of an infectious disease may occur through one or more of diverse pathways including physical contact with infected individuals. These infecting agents may also be transmitted through liquids, food, body fluids, contaminated objects, airborne inhalation, or through vector-borne spread.
The term infectivity describes the ability of an organism to enter, survive and multiply in the host, while the infectiousness of a disease indicates the comparative ease with which the disease is transmitted to other hosts. An infection however, is not synonymous with an infectious disease, as an infection may not cause important clinical symptoms or impair host function.
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News tagged with infectious diseases
Cells defend themselves from viruses, bacteria with armor of protein errors
Nov 25, 2009 |
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When cells are confronted with an invading virus or bacteria or exposed to an irritating chemical, they protect themselves by going off their DNA recipe and inserting the wrong amino acid into new proteins to defend them ...
New explanation for nature's hardiest life form
Nov 12, 2009 |
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Got food poisoning? The cause might be bacterial spores, en extremely hardy survival form of bacteria, a nightmare for health care and the food industry and an enigma for scientists. Spore-forming bacteria, present almost ...
Prevention experts urge modification to 2009 H1N1 guidance for health care workers
Nov 06, 2009 |
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Three leading scientific organizations specializing in infectious diseases prevention issued a letter to President Obama today expressing their significant concern with current federal guidance concerning the use of personal ...
The protein Srebp2 drives cholesterol formation in prion-infected neuronal cells
Nov 18, 2009 |
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Prions are causing fatal and infectious diseases of the nervous system, such as the mad cow disease (BSE), scrapie in sheep or Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans. Scientists of Helmholtz Zentrum München and Technische Universität ...
Poorly cleaned public cruise ship restrooms may predict norovirus outbreaks
Nov 02, 2009 |
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A team of researchers from Boston University School (BUSM), Carney Hospital, Cambridge Health Alliance and Tufts University School of Medicine, have found that widespread poor compliance with regular cleaning of public restrooms ...
Flu vaccine given to women during pregnancy keeps infants out of the hospital
Nov 02, 2009 |
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Infants born to women who received influenza vaccine during pregnancy were hospitalized at a lower rate than infants born to unvaccinated mothers, according to preliminary results of an ongoing study by researchers at Yale ...
Journal special edition outlines rotavirus burden and need for vaccines
Nov 05, 2009 |
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The Journal of Infectious Diseases has released a special edition, Global Rotavirus Surveillance: Preparing for the Introduction of Rotavirus Vaccines. This special edition provides a significant contribution to the unders ...
Research calls for better assessment of tests for tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and malaria
Nov 17, 2009 |
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A rapid and accurate diagnosis is the first step towards treatment in the fight against infectious disease. However, a team headed by Dr. Madhukar Pai at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) ...
Could Widely Used Rapid Influenza Tests Pose A Dangerous Public Health Risk?
Nov 17, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Rapid influenza diagnostic tests used in doctors' offices, hospitals and medical laboratories to detect H1N1 are virtually useless and could pose a significant danger to public health, according to a Loyola ...
Preventing H1N1 spread to health care workers: Dilemma, debate and confusion
Nov 19, 2009 |
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A commentary in the December issue of The Lancet Infectious Diseases brings to light the gaps in knowledge on the transmission of a common pathogen - the influenza virus - and its impact on decisions about how best to pro ...
New findings suggest strategy to help generate HIV-neutralizing antibodies
Medicine & Health / HIV & AIDS
Nov 19, 2009 |
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New discoveries about anti-HIV antibodies may bring researchers a step closer to creating an effective HIV vaccine, according to a new paper co-authored by scientists at the Vaccine Research Center of the National Institute ...
Cost of child vaccines fall, more kids saved
Nov 20, 2009 |
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(AP) -- Babies squirmed and wailed as needles plunged into their chubby thighs at a public health clinic on the outskirts of Hanoi on Friday. Like little ones everywhere, the reaction to the sting was never pretty.
New study finds MRSA on the rise in hospital outpatients
Nov 24, 2009 |
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The community-associated strain of the deadly superbug MRSA -- an infection-causing bacteria resistant to most common antibiotics -- poses a far greater health threat than previously known and is making its way into hospitals, ...
School closure could reduce swine flu transmission by 21 percent
Nov 27, 2009 |
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A survey carried out in eight European countries has shown that closing schools in the event of an infectious disease pandemic could have a significant role in reducing illness transmission. Researchers writing in the open ...
