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Zookeepers are counting their losses after the tragic deaths of around 50 of their 69 penguins due to an avian malaria outbreak.Dozens of Humboldt penguins at Dudley Zoo have died having contracted the disease, leading to an outpouring of sympathy and sadness from zoo fans. Similar to human malaria, avian malaria is a parasitic disease transmitted through the bite of infected mosquitoes. It cannot be passed on to humans or other animal species, but penguins are particularly susceptible to it as they do not have natural immunity to the disease. This is a completely separate disease to avian flu, which...

More than 260,000 children under age 5 die each year from malaria. The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended the widespread use of a malaria vaccine among children in Africa and other areas of high malaria transmission — a breakthrough in the long fight against the deadly disease. Malaria is a parasite-caused disease that's been around for thousands of years and is transmitted primarily via mosquito bites. It kills more than 400,000 people around the world each year, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa. More than 260,000 children under age 5 die each year from malaria. The road to an effective malaria...

Imagine this: A pesky mosquito sips some of your blood. Hours later, the blood-sucker drops dead, poisoned by the very blood it just slurped down. That may sound too good to be true, but it's a tantalizing possibility, according to research published this week in the journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases. The study points to a potential new tool to fight malaria: the medication ivermectin. Studies conducted in the 2000s, including one in 2010, show that malaria-carrying mosquitoes die after feeding on individuals who have ingested the drug. ......... In their study, the researchers demonstrate that three high doses of...

A trial combining vaccinations and prevention drugs has substantially lowered the number of children dying of malaria in two African countries, according to researchers. The results of the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, have been hailed as “very striking”, especially at a time when decades-long progress on combating malaria has stalled in some countries. Led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), the trial showed a 70% reduction in hospitalisation or death when young children were given both seasonal vaccinations and antimalarial drugs compared to using just one intervention. ...The LSHTM research followed...

Recent advancements allow for novel approaches against an old enemy. Scientists from the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and Naval Medical Research Center partnered with researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and Acuitas Therapeutics to develop a novel vaccine based on mRNA technology that protects against malaria in animal models, publishing their findings in npj Vaccines. In 2019, there were an estimated 229 million cases of malaria and 409,000 deaths globally, creating an extraordinary cost in terms of human morbidity, mortality, economic burden, and regional social stability. Worldwide, Plasmodium falciparum is the parasite species that causes the vast majority...

New bioarchaeological research shows malaria has threatened human communities for more than 7000 years, earlier than when the onset of farming was thought to have sparked its devastating arrival..."Until now we've believed malaria became a global threat to humans when we turned to farming, but our research shows in at least Southeast Asia this disease was a threat to human groups well before that."This research providing a new cornerstone of malaria's evolution with humans is a great achievement by the entire team," Dr Vlok says...While malaria is invisible in the archaeological record, the disease has changed the evolutionary history of...

Resistance to the gold-standard malaria treatment, the drug artemisinin, has been rising in southeast Asia for a decade — and there is evidence that artemisinin-based therapies might start to fail in Rwanda, too. In Asia, artemisinin drug resistance has been linked to various mutations in the ‘K13’ section of the genome of the most deadly malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum. Aline Uwimana at the Rwanda Biomedical Centre in Kigali, Didier Menard at the Pasteur Institute in Paris and their colleagues detected K13 mutations in P. falciparum parasites collected from people with malaria in Rwanda. The team genetically modified parasites to harbour...

As the world battles the novel Coronavirus pandemic, there is a surge in demand for hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), a common anti-malarial drug that, in some quarters, has been touted as a possible “miracle drug” in the fight against COVID-19. The world has knocked the doors of India to get supplies of this drug, given that it produces nearly half the world's HCQ tablets. It'll be interesting to note that the history of this "game-changer" drug goes two centuries back all the way to the British imperial expansion in India. According to a Twitter thread by a user named Primordial Kāshyap, hydroxychloroquine's...

Top Medical Body ICMR Issues Revised Advisory On Use Of Anti-Malarial Drug Hydroxychloroquine The revised advisory issued by the ICMR on Friday, however, cautioned that the intake of the medicine should not instill a sense of false security. Press Trust of India NDTV May 23, 2020 New Delhi:  A revised government advisory has recommended use of hydroxychloroquine as a preventive medication for asymptomatic healthcare workers working in non-COVID-19 hospitals, frontline staff on surveillance duty in containment zones and paramilitary/police personnel involved in coronavirus infection related activities. As was mentioned in the earlier advisory, the drug against the infection is also...

Anyone remember these? They've been off market for years. My Mom cured everything from a cold to chicken pox with this stuff. We all took it. It is QUININE.. similar to the malaria drug they are testing for the Pelosi (China) Virus. Quinine is the generic form of the brand-name drug qualaquin, a medication used to treat uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria, a specific type of malaria. SEE also: Here's a vintage commercial for 4-Way Cold Tablets, showing the difference between it and a regular cold capsule in terms of the relief that is offered - 4-Way providing relief for nasal...

A new survey from Jackson & Coker shows an overwhelming majority of doctors would prescribe hydroxychloroquine or another anti-malaria drug to a family member suffering from Wuhan coronavirus. "Sixty-five percent of physicians across the United States said they would prescribe the anti-malaria drugs chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine to treat or prevent COVID-19 in a family member," the survey, which questioned 1,271 doctors in 50 states, found. "Only 11 percent said they would not use the drug at all." In addition, a significant number of doctors said they would prescribe the drugs to those exposed to the virus as a preventative measure...

After reading the paper, https://archive.is/ONUmi, about the way COVID-19 makes people ill, it strikes me that there may be a quicker, and cheaper, way to screen for infected people. It may not be 100%, but it may be a start.

Well, that didn't take long.CNN host John Berman had hoped to talk about the – reading now from the lower third on the screen –"HEATED DISAGREEMENT IN WH SITUATION ROOM OVER UNPROVEN DRUG"! QUICK, AN ARGUMENT! SOMEONE DO SOMETHING! TRUMP WILL KILL US ALL! ORANGE MAN BAD!Instead what he got from Trade Representative Peter Navarro, who's on the Trump administration's coronavirus task force, was an education.As Real Clear Politics helpfully transcribed, Berman was trying to talk up the reported argument Navarro had with Dr. Anthony Fauci over trying the FDA approved malaria drug, hydroxychloroquine on coronavirus patients. Fauci says...

The HuffPost on Tuesday published a story claiming President Trump owned a share in a company that manufactured hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malaria drug the president and others have touted as a possible treatment for coronavirus. The story, titled “Donald Trump Has Stake In Hydroxychloroquine Drugmaker: Report,” argues that Trump “reportedly owns a stake in a company that produces hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malaria drug he has repeatedly touted as a coronavirus treatment even though his experts say there’s no strong evidence it works.” The story goes on to cite a New York Times story that Trump “has a small personal financial interest” in...

In the last 3–5 days, a mountain of anecdotal evidence has come out of NYC, Italy, Spain, etc. about COVID-19 and characteristics of patients who get seriously ill. It’s not only piling up but now leading to a general field-level consensus backed up by a few previously little-known studies that we’ve had it all wrong the whole time. Well, a few had some things eerily correct (cough Trump cough), especially with Hydroxychloroquine with Azithromicin, but we’ll get to that in a minute. There is no ‘pneumonia’ nor ARDS. At least not the ARDS with established treatment protocols and procedures we’re...

this insanity from Rep. Tavia Galonski about The Hague and charging Trump with ‘crimes against humanity’ takes the insanity cake. I can’t take it anymore. I’ve been to The Hague. I’m making a referral for crimes against humanity tomorrow. Today’s press conference was the last straw. I know the need for a prosecution referral when I see one. https://t.co/XQin24gqY4 — Rep. Tavia Galonski

Democratic state representative in Ohio said she "can't take it anymore" and vowed to refer President Trump to the International Criminal Court for "crimes against humanity" over Trump's promotion of a drug that has not been conclusively proven to fight the coronavirus. State Rep. Tavia Galonski tweeted Sunday after President Trump spoke about hydroxychloroquine at his daily press briefing. The drug, normally used to treat malaria, is one of several that the president has pointed to as showing promise in the fight against COVID-19, but its effectiveness has been a subject of debate. "I can’t take it anymore. I’ve been...

World Health Organization The Wuhan virus has shown that even during pandemics, the WHO will put politics ahead of public health. During a recent interview with Hong Kong news outlet RTHK, Bruce Aylward, a physician and senior adviser to the World Health OrganizationÂ’s director general, refused to answer a question about TaiwanÂ’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. A clip of the exchange has been viewed thousands of times on Twitter, and there are growing calls for Aylward to explain himself.DonÂ’t expect him to. AylwardÂ’s behavior is just the latest in a long line of instances of the WHO putting politics...

Doctors in Italy have finally began widely prescribing hydroxychloroquine in certain combinations in Rome and the wider region of Lazio with a population of around six million. According to Corriere della Sera, a well known Italian daily newspaper, Dr. Pier Luigi Bartoletti, Deputy National Secretary of the Italian Federation of General Practitioners, explains that every single person with Covid-19 that has early signs, like a cough or a fever for example, is now being treated with the anti-malaria drug. The drug “is already giving good results,” Bartoletti says while Malaysia reveals they have been using it since the very beginning....

From a disease standpoint, Shakespeare was living in arguably the worst place and time in history. Shakespeare's overcrowded, rat-infested, sexually promiscuous London, with raw sewage flowing in the Thames, was the hub for the nastiest diseases known to mankind. Here are the worst of the worst. 1. Plague It is little surprise that the plague was the most dreaded disease of Shakespeare's time. Carried by fleas living on the fur of rats, the plague swept through London in 1563, 1578-9, 1582, 1592-3, and 1603 (Singman, 52). The outbreaks in 1563 and 1603 were the most ferocious, each wiping out over...