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July 22, 2014Meghan DeMaria In a scientific paper published Tuesday, scientists suggested that Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) may be airborne. The disease has already claimed at least 288 lives since its appearance in 2012. Researchers at King Fahd Medical Research Center in Saudi Arabia analyzed air samples from an infected camel barn, and the samples tested positive for a strain of the viral genome MERS RNA, CNN reports. The possibility of MERS being airborne has been in question after reports found that some infected people had close contact with other MERS patients. The WHO recommends that "airborne precautions should...

If the rate stays on track, 2014 could break 2010's record high of 1,179 casesSan Diego County has seen more than double the number of pertussis cases this year compared to last, according to the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA). Nine new instances of whooping cough, which may have left others exposed, brings the county’s total to 895. Just 120 cases were reported by this time last year, and for the whole of 2013, 431 cases were confirmed. “The county and state are experiencing an epidemic of pertussis,” said Wilma J. Wooten, M.D., a county public...

Dr. Elaina George, an ear, nose, throat and chest specialist from Atlanta, told Charles Payne on FOX News today that the US could be facing a health crisis as the thousands of newly illegal children enter the classrooms this fall. “There’s an example in Maryland, where parents got a letter from the school that there children had been exposed to an illegal child who had TB who was one of their classmates. So this fall it is potentially possible that these children entering the school systems could be carrying all sorts of things, diseases that are not on the radar.”...

Immigration: With medical professionals overwhelmed by border chaos, illegal aliens are being sent across the U.S. without basic health screening, raising the prospect of epidemics of diseases once thought eradicated. As unaccompanied minors from Central America who have flooded across President Obama's open borders are dispersed nationwide from Nebraska to Illinois to Massachusetts, concerns have arisen that the nation's health has been put at risk by poor and even absent medical screening. An internal Department of Defense memo obtained by ABC News reports that the director of refugee health at Health and Human Services "has identified a breakdown of the...

(English-language translation) The Department of Health declared a Chikungunya virus epidemic in Puerto Rico since it is a new virus in the island, the population does not have the antibodies to fight it, and cases are concentrated in the same zone. As of June 25, 206 cases were reported in the island. It was [also] reported that 89% of cases in Puerto Rico were registered in the Metropolitan Area: San Juan, Carolina, and Bayamón. So reported Health Secretary Ana Rius this morning, explaining at the same time that, through Administrative Order 324 that declares the epidemic, all health plans must...

Catholic Charities wants to care for about 50 children from Central America at a campus in Baltimore County, seeking a role in the immigration crisis even though the consideration of other sites in Maryland has met with fierce local opposition.The organization plans to apply to federal officials to house the children at St. Vincent's Villa, a residential facility on Dulaney Valley Road, Catholic Charities head William J. McCarthy Jr. confirmed Thursday night.McCarthy said housing the children would amount to his organization doing its job. "Our role and our mission is to meet the needs of these children," he said. "This...

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) reportedly sent illegal immigrant children with communicable diseases on planes to sites around the country that are being forced to house them. According to an ABC News report, HHS has admitted to "a breakdown of the medical screening processes" at an Arizona facility. While the illegal immigrant children were clear of symptoms during their initial screenings, they were not "re-screened and cleared for travel and placement at a temporary shelter.” Children with fevers and pneumonia have been flown from Arizona to California, where they had to be hospitalized. Three other children are...

The federal government is so overwhelmed by the current tide of migrants crossing the border it can’t provide basic medical screening to all of the children before transporting them – often by air – to longer-term holding facilities across the country, ABC News has learned. The director of refugee health in the federal Health and Human Services Department “has identified a breakdown of the medical screening processes at the Nogales, Arizona, facility,” according to an internal Department of Defense memo reviewed by ABC News. The “breakdown” a systemic failure of the handoff of these children between CBP and HHS.

We have an immigration problem along our southern border, mostly with the Texas portion. The border is leaking like a sieve, with hundreds of children fleeing Central America and the drug induced bloodshed that has moved recently from Mexico down to Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala. A child has a higher chance of being killed in Central America than they do in Chicago’s South Side. Who are buying the drugs that are causing all the violence in Central America? Americans are. So if we want to stop the influx of children from Central America we need to do something about...

DAYTON -- We've shown you how tens of thousands of unaccompanied children are now surging our southern border. Many of those children are now being shipped across the country. So we wanted to know, would Dayton accept them? Mayor Nan Whaley says Dayton would be willing to extend their welcome mat again to these children in need. "This is a product of having no immigration reform by the federal government. We've continually asked Congres to act on this issue becasue we know these things can happen," Mayor Whaley said Thursday……

Health authorities at a Navy base in Southern California took steps last weekend to curtail an outbreak of pneumonia and swine flu among illegal immigrant children housed at the facility, according to U.S. officials. The outbreak of disease among several of the nearly 600 immigrant children at the Naval Base Ventura County, located north of Los Angeles, initially was thought to be caused by deadly bacterial streptococcal meningitis, according to one official close to the issue. However, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said he was not aware of any cases of meningitis at the...

Forty years ago, a group of researchers with military money set out to test the wacky idea of making computers talk to one another in a new way, using digital information packets that could be traded among multiple machines rather than telephonic, point-to-point circuit relays. The project, called ARPANET, went on to fundamentally change life on Earth under its more common name, the Internet. Today, the agency that bankrolled the Internet is called the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, which boasts a rising budget of nearly $3 billion split across 250 programs. They all have national security implications...

Health authorities at a Navy base in Southern California took steps last weekend to curtail an outbreak of pneumonia and swine flu among illegal immigrant children housed at the facility, according to U.S. officials. The outbreak of disease among several of the nearly 600 immigrant children at the Naval Base Ventura County, located north of Los Angeles, initially was thought to be caused by deadly bacterial streptococcal meningitis, according to one official close to the issue. However, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said he was not aware of any cases of meningitis at the...

One of my Fifties Journalism professors told us budding reporters to “Let their own words speak for themselves.” He was giving us details for covering suspected misconduct of authority figures. Just read the actual words of the Obama administration’s description of its Office of Refugee Resettlement: “The ORR provides NEW POPULATIONS with the opportunity to maximize their potential in the UNITED STATES. Our programs provide people in need with critical resources to assist them IN BECOMING INTEGRATED MEMBERS OF AMERICAN SOCIETY.” (1) If that doesn’t tell you these hordes of Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) are here to stay, nothing will....

(NOTE — Update at the End of the Column) One of the things that changes you, when you become a parent, is the body of knowledge you acquire to protect your spouse and children including things like knowledge of infectious diseases in public schools. In my case that meant looking at the NY Times saying the following: “…the administration has begun to send the expected 240,000 migrants and 52,000 unaccompanied minors who have crossed the border illegally in recent months in the Rio Grande Valley to cities around the county.” And at headlines for the open border crisis like this...

The hordes of illegal immigrant minors entering the U.S. are bringing serious diseases—including swine flu, dengue fever, Ebola virus and tuberculosis—that present a danger to the American public as well as the Border Patrol agents forced to care for the kids, according to a U.S. Congressman who is also medical doctor. This has created a “severe and dangerous” crisis, says the Georgia lawmaker, Phil Gingrey. Most of the Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) are coming from Central America and they’re importing infectious diseases considered to be largely eradicated in this country. Additionally, many of the migrants lack basic vaccinations such as...

Dr. Manny: Is America on the verge of a major health crisis? The recent surge of immigrants at the Texas-Mexico border – many of whom are unaccompanied minors – is the latest catastrophe under the Obama administration’s immigration policy that is seriously putting the health of our nation at risk. Modern public health policies clearly describe conditions which could lead to mass outbreaks of diseases, and what’s going on now is the perfect storm. State health officials touring one of the detention centers in Texas recently reported several issues including a lack of medicine for children, and insufficient medical screenings...

Are the thousands of illegal immigrant kids housed in detention facilities happy and well fed -- or are they living in disease-infested compounds shrouded in secrecy? Well, it depends on who you ask. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) seems to think the children coming across the southern border are remarkably healthy. It's a sentiment shared by BCFS -- the Texas-based agency formerly known as Baptist Child & Family Services contracted to run camps at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio and Fort Sill in Oklahoma.

Todd Starnes told Sean Hannity on FOX News tonight that the illegal immigrant children held at Lackland Air Force base in Oklahoma are bringing diseases into America. The children have tuberculosis, scabies and lice so bad you can see them running down their faces. “It’s one giant emergency room. They tell me tuberculosis has become a very dangerous issue there. Nurses say the number of children representing symptoms of tuberculosis is ‘simply staggering.’ Spitting up blood, chest pains, constant coughing. There are at least three confirmed cases for the illegals in Austin, Texas… The federal government is covering up the...

Scientists led by Dr David Fairlie from the University of Queensland, Australia, have found abnormal amounts of an inflammatory protein called PAR2 in the fat tissues of overweight and obese rats and humans. PAR2 is also increased on the surfaces of human immune cells by common fatty acids in the diet. When obese rats on a diet high in sugar and fat were given a new oral drug that binds to PAR2, the inflammation-causing properties of this protein were blocked, as were other effects of the high-fat and high-sugar diet, including obesity itself. "This important new finding links obesity and...