Journalist and Author
Big news in the world of food policy, farming and antibiotic use: Perdue Farms, the third-largest chicken producer in the United States, announced today that during the past decade it has ceased using most of the antibiotics that formerly propped up its chicken production. There are caveats to that “most,” and I’ll explain them. But […]
Read MoreI said last month that I was going to try to stay out of Ebola news because so much is being written about it elsewhere. Since then, the African outbreak — now really an epidemic, since it is in multiple countries — has ballooned to 3,000 cases, and the World Health Organization has predicted it […]
Read MoreIn a new study, researchers measured the gut biomes and obesity levels of mice under various antibiotic regimes, and found some compelling correlations.
Read MoreI’ve stayed out of the Ebola news so far, for a couple of reasons. First, as longtime readers know, I’m writing a book; I’m in the last 6 months of it and the work is intense and involves a lot of travel. I’m not always available at the exact moment news breaks. Second, I try […]
Read MoreThere’s worrisome news here in the southeastern US, buried in a journal that is favorite reading only for superbug geeks like me. The rate at which hospitals are recognizing cases of CRE — the form of antibiotic resistance that is so serious the CDC dubbed it a “nightmare”—rose five times over between 2008 and 2012.
Read MoreRemember those six vials of smallpox-causing variola that the feds found last week? They were found in the company of 321 other vials of various deadly diseases.
Read MoreThe nation’s top health leaders will appear in front of congress today to answer questions about the recent lab accidents involving smallpox and avian flu.
Read MoreThe scientist who led the effort to eradicate smallpox in the 1960s speaks out about the vials of the virus recently found in a storage room.
Read MoreHere’s an update on the vials found on the National Institutes of Health campus last week that were labeled smallpox, and transported earlier this week to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: The CDC and NIH have both confirmed that the virus in two of the tubes is viable. That is, if the vials […]
Read MoreAmong the groups that work on awareness of antibiotics resistance — which include major medical and public health organizations as well as nonprofits trying to direct attention to antibiotic misuse in medicine and agriculture — there has been a lot of anticipation of a forthcoming report by the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and […]
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