See what we’re reading this week at Global Biodefense on topics including CRISPR bioterror potential, accidental live anthrax use during CDP training, and global action plan for antimicrobial resistance.
POLICY, PRACTICES & POLITICS
- Officials say CDP trainees practiced with live toxin because of mix up (Anniston Star)
- Obama advisers urge action against CRISPR bioterror threat (MIT Tech Review)
- Letter to the President on action needed to protect against biological attack (PCAST)
- WHO global action plan on antimicrobial resistance (Pandora Report)
- Partner with CDC to host and train the future public health workforce (NACCHO)
- Biodefense spending and waste: Impact on public health initiatives (De Gruyter)
- K-State researchers aim to heighten feed mill biosecurity (HPJ)
- Zika is no longer global emergency, W.H.O. says (NY Times)
- The commercial determinants of health (The Lancet)
BIOPREPAREDNESS
- Biotechnology and biological threats: The new landscape (White House)
- This is a test: Georgia practices for bioterrorist threats (CDC)
- ISN-CTR Biosecurity Engagement Program FY17 NOFO (Grants.gov)
- Tabletop Exercise on implementation of Article VII of the BTWC (The Trench)
- U.S. military preps for gene drives run amok (Scientific American)
- Are we ready for the next epidemic? (PRI)
SELECT AGENTS
- Mild Ebola cases may mean outbreak larger than thought (CIDRAP)
- Half of Ebola screening staff at Heathrow ‘were not clinically qualified’ (The Guardian)
- Phoenix Air upgrades to super-sized medevac plane (AJC)
- Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever virus and Eid-Ul-Adha festival (The Lancet)
- Undetected Ebola infections suggest more widespread than thought (LA Times)
- From outbreak to pandemic: Newspaper coverage of the Ebola epidemic (CJC)
- What if you had Ebola and didn’t even know it? (NPR)
MEDICAL COUNTERMEASURES
- The race for a Zika vaccine (NY Times)
- First-line of defence against nerve agent-poisoning (Springer)
OUTBREAK NEWS & THREAT SURVEILLANCE
- Zika virus in Pakistan: the tip of the iceberg? (The Lancet)
- H5N8 expands in Europe; other strains strike elsewhere (CIDRAP)
- Geographic variability in Zika-related birth defects baffles scientists (Scientific American)
- Outbreak of enterovirus D68 of the new B3 lineage in Stockholm, Sweden (Eurosurveillance)
- Rift valley fever epidemic in Niger near border with Mali (The Lancet)
- Emerging resistant clone of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in west Asia (The Lancet)
RESEARCH & TECH
- Aptamers as a promising approach for the control of parasitic diseases (BRJID)
- Florida keys approves trial of genetically-modified mosquitoes to fight Zika (NPR)
- A precise and objective tool for tuberculosis detection (The Lancet)
SPECIAL INTEREST
- Quiz: Test your antibiotic resistance knowledge (PEW)
- How New York hunts for early signs of disease outbreaks (FiveThirtyEight)
- New York’s ATMs teem with nasty stuff (CityLab)