Tag: diseases
‘Neglected tropical diseases’ now face even more neglect
By Patrick Adams For close to two decades, the U.S. Agency for International Development has partnered with countries around the world to combat neglected tropical diseases, or NTDs. The term refers to a group of diseases that affect more than a billion people, causing severe pain, disfigurement, disability and in some cases death. They’re referred…
A Public Health Researcher and Her Engineer Husband Found How Diseases Can Spread through Air Decades before the COVID Pandemic
Mildred Weeks Wells’s Work on Airborne Transmission Could Have Saved Many Lives—If the Scientific Establishment Listened Mildred Weeks Wells and her husband figured out that disease-causing pathogens can spread through the air like smoke By Carol Sutton Lewis, Luca Evans & The Lost Women of Science Initiative LISTEN TO THE PODCAST If you’re enjoying this…
How Measles, Polio and Other Eliminated Diseases Could Roar Back If U.S. Vaccination Rates Fall
See the Dramatic Consequences of Vaccination Rates Teetering on a ‘Knife’s Edge’ As U.S. childhood vaccination rates sway on a “knife’s edge,” new 25-year projections reveal how slight changes in national immunization could improve—or drastically reverse—the prevalence of measles, polio, rubella and diphtheria By Lauren J. Young edited by Dean Visser Measles, rubella, polio and…
Vagus nerve stimulation may tame autoimmune diseases
Jon Hamilton Tiny pulses of electricity may provide the next big advance in treating diseases like rheumatoid arthritis. The pulses would be delivered via implanted devices that stimulate the vagus nerve, and they are showing promise in people with arthritis and other autoimmune diseases, including Crohn’s, and multiple sclerosis. Currently, autoimmune diseases are usually treated…