CDC updates guidance to cruise ship industry, urges vaccinations

WASHINGTON— The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention on Friday issued new guidance to the cruise ship industry, including the need for COVID-19 vaccinations, a necessary step before passenger voyages can resume.

The new technical instructions, the first update since October, include increasing from weekly to daily reporting frequency of COVID-19 cases and illnesses and implementing routine testing of all crew based on a ship’s COVID-19 status and establishing a plan and timeline for vaccination of crew and port personnel.

"COVID-19 vaccination efforts will be critical in the safe resumption of passenger operations," the CDC said.

CDC said the next phase of the CDC's conditional sail order will include simulated voyages to will allow crew and port personnel to practice new COVID-19 operational procedures with volunteers before sailing with passengers.

"CDC is committed to working with the cruise industry and seaport partners to resume cruising when it is safe to do so, following the phased approach outlined in October's conditional sail order," the agency said.

It did not specify a date for the resumption of cruise operations from US ports despite calls from the industry for planning for a phased resumption by the beginning of July. The CDC said it would issue additional guidance before it allows cruises to resume.

The Cruise Lines International Association, which represents Carnival Corp, Norwegian Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean Cruises and others had pleaded with CDC to issue new guidance, saying in a March 24 statement the "lack of any action by the CDC has effectively banned all sailings in the largest cruise market in the world." It did not immediately comment on Friday.

The group had said the prior conditional sail order issued in October was "outdated" and "does not reflect the industry’s proven advancements and success operating in other parts of the world, nor the advent of vaccines, and unfairly treats cruises differently. Cruise lines should be treated the same as other travel, tourism, hospitality, and entertainment sectors." 

-reuters

Obama sends 3,000 troops to W. Africa to 'turn tide' on Ebola

WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama will try to "turn the tide" on the Ebola epidemic Tuesday by ordering 3,000 US military personnel to west Africa to curtail its spread as China also dispatched more experts to the region.

The White House said Obama will travel to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta -- where US Ebola victims were treated -- to make the announcement, meant to spur a global effort to tackle the outbreak that has already killed 2,400 people.

It comes as alarm grows that the worst-ever Ebola epidemic which spread through Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea before reaching Nigeria, is out of control. A separate strain of the disease has appeared in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Most of the US effort, which will draw heavily on its military medical corps, will be concentrated in impoverished Liberia -- the worst hit nation -- with plans to build 17 Ebola treatment centres with 100 beds in each.

China is also sending more medics to neighbouring Sierra Leone to help boost laboratory testing for the virus, raising the total number of Chinese medical experts there to 174, the UN said Tuesday.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said Tuesday it was reconvening its emergency committee in Geneva which declared the outbreak an international health emergency in August, to consider further measures to limit its spread.

Obama will announce that US Africa Command will set up a headquarters in the Sierra Leone capital Monrovia to act as a command and control centre for US military and international relief programmes.

But the main element of the push is a six-month training and hygiene drive to tackle the disease head-on.

US advisors will train up to 500 Liberian health care providers per week in how to safely handle and treat victims and their families in a bid to shore up the country's overwhelmed health infrastructure.

The intervention will involve an estimated 3,000 US military personnel, senior officials said, many working at a staging base for transit of equipment and personnel.

Washington will also send 65 experts from the public health service corps to Liberia to manage and staff a previously announced US military hospital to care for health workers who become sick with Ebola.

Ebola prevention kits, including disinfectant and advice, will also be supplied to 400,000 of the most vulnerable families in Liberia.

"What is clear is in order to combat and contain the outbreak at its source, we need to partner and lead an international response," said one senior US official, on condition of anonymity.

China said it is sending a mobile laboratory team to Sierra Leone, where more than 500 people have died so far from Ebola. The 59-person team from the Chinese Centre for Disease Control will include epidemiologists, clinicians and nurses, the WHO said.

"The newly announced team will join 115 Chinese medical staff on the ground in Sierra Leone virtually since the beginning," the agency's chief Margaret Chan said, hailing the new commitment as "a huge boost, morally and operationally".

Liberian Red Cross health workers wearing protective suits carry the body of a victim of the Ebola virus on September 12, 2014 in a district of Monrovia. AFP

source: interaksyon.com

US warns of microbes resistant to antibiotics

WASHINGTON - At least two million people per year in the United States get infections that are resistant to antibiotics and 23,000 die from those infections, a new study says.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said these numbers are only a conservative estimate. Among other reasons, they come only from infections reported in hospitals and do not address ones that occur in nursing homes and other health care facilities.

The numbers underline the importance of not overusing antibiotics.  



In as many as half of the cases studied, antibiotic use was not necessary or was even inappropriate, such as in viral infections, for instance, the researchers said.

The report also warns against the danger of running short on effective treatments against infection while the number of new antibiotics being developed fails to meet short-term needs.

"If we're not careful, we will soon be in a post antibiotic era," CDC director Tom Frieden said.

"And, in fact, for some patients and some microbes, we are already there. Losing effective treatment will not only undermine our ability to fight routine infections, but also have serious complications, serious implications, for people who have other medical problems," he said.

Most of the 18 microbes included in the study are common, and were divided into three categories depending on their degree of risk: urgent, concerning and important.

Within the urgent group, there are three of particular interest: they are called carbapenem-resistant enterobacteriaceae, C. difficile, and drug-resistant gonorrhea, he said.

The first of those is a "nightmare bacteria" that can essentially resist all antibiotics and kill people who get it in their blood.

C. difficile is a life-threatening infection associated with 14,000 deaths and a quarter of a million hospitalizations per year.

As for gonorrhea, there are more than 800,000 infections in the United States each year, with a growing proportion resistant to all available medication.

The way to fight all this is to prevent infection and the spread of resistance, through immunization, safe food preparation and hand washing, the CDC said.

source: interaksyon.com

7 dead in spreading US meningitis outbreak

WASHINGTON DC - At least seven people have died and 91 have fallen ill in the United States in a worsening meningitis outbreak tied to a contaminated drug, updated figures showed Sunday.

Cases have been identified in nine states, with the hardest-hit being Tennessee, where 32 people have been diagnosed with the fungal infection and three have died, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

Michigan is the second-most infected state, with 20 cases and two deaths, so far. Cases have also been noted in a vast region spanning Florida, Maryland and Minnesota.

In its latest bulletin, the CDC urged doctors to "actively contact" any patients who received doses of the potentially contaminated steroid injection -- typically used to treat back pain -- as far back as May 21.

The public health agency said symptoms of fungal meningitis, which has a very long incubation period, include fever, new or worsening headaches, neck stiffness, sensitivity to light, new weakness or numbness, increasing pain, redness or swelling of the injection site.

The rare infection -- which inflames the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord -- often goes undetected until it is too late because its flu-like symptoms can be mild at first. But meningitis is not contagious in this form.

Early detection and treatment -- requiring a hospital stay to administer intravenous anti-fungal medications -- can prevent permanent damage.

An initial investigation found that Tennessee clinicians who administered the contaminated drug "had no way of knowing" there was anything wrong with it and found "no lapses" in their standards, according to the state's health commissioner John Dreyzehner.

"The evidence indicates this is a product issue," he told reporters on Friday.

A multi-state investigation is underway to determine the cause of the outbreak, but the Food and Drug Administration said it had detected a fungal contaminant in a sealed vial of the drug produced by the New England Compounding Center in Massachusetts.

While further testing is required to confirm it was the source of the outbreak, the company has issued a voluntary recall of all of its products and shut down all operations.

Officials posted a list of the 75 health care facilities that received lots of the contaminated drug at: www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis-facilities-map.html.

source: interaksyon.com