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For a year, in this column, growing evidence has been presented about the possibility of a new deadly virus being transmitted from human to human, a virus with a mortality rate of 42.6%. Questions have been raised as to what the world health authorities have been doing to protect us, and now the chilling truth: it is transmitted from human to human

The new virus is called Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV). It appeared in 2012 and its incidence has been focused principally around the Gulf States.

In January (1), I raised the alarm, presenting my first fears about how the WHO would handle what was then a new and deadly virus with an unknown transmission mechanism.

In February (2), I warned: "The scientific community is facing its worst nightmare: a pathogenic virus with the capacity to make a species jump and then become transmissible from human to human. It is called NCoV, or Novel coronavirus", in an article which posed the question as to whether all cases were being reported, and whether or not human to human transmission had occurred.

The World Health Organization, the same organism that stood back and watched as Influenza A H1N1 became a pandemic, informing us of the different phases the disease was passing through, without imposing any restrictive measures on movement of people or goods, yet again reduced its activities to saying "be vigilant" and not advising any travel restrictions.

In May (3), I asked about the "confirmed cases in Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), France, Germany, Tunisia and the United Kingdom" and again questioned how the statistics were drawn up and whether or not there were cases outside the loop that were not being considered.

In September (4), I referred to "the latest four laboratory-confirmed cases were reported by the World Health Organization on August 30, a 55-year-old man from Medina, Saudi Arabia who is hospitalized and another man, 38, from Hafar-al-Batin, Saudi Arabia, who died nine days after contracting the disease", raising the issue that "Two of his family members are also infected (a 16-year-old boy and a 7-year-old girl)".

And now, the latest bulletin from the World Health Organization, dated November 4, states that the latest patient to die of the disease, a 56-year-old woman who became ill on October 26 and died on October 30, "had no contact with animals, but had contact with a previously laboratory confirmed case".

The report continues: "Globally, from September 2012 to date, WHO has been informed of a total of 150 laboratory-confirmed cases of infection with MERS-CoV, including 64 deaths". That is a death rate of 42.6%, making it one of the most deadly viruses ever to have appeared. Spanish Influenza (1918-1920), which killed between 3 and 5 per cent of the world's population, had a mortality rate of 20 per cent at worst.

Yet what does the WHO recommend? It encourages member states to continue surveillance (i.e. sit back and watch), test recent travelers who develop SARI (Severe Acute Respiratory Infections) for MERS-CoV (while allowing them to make the Hajj instead of prohibiting it). The WHO, in stating "Health care facilities that provide care for patients suspected or confirmed with MERS-CoV infection should take appropriate measures to decrease the risk of transmission of the virus to other patients, health care workers and visitors" is admitting that human to human transmission exists.

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Deadly disease: Worst fears confirmed

One of the worlds leading experts on mysterious killer diseases like the SARS coronavirus, the West Nile virus and the colony collapse disorder affecting bees is coming to Hamilton to give a presentation about his profession and his work as a consultant on the Hollywood film Contagion.

Dr. W. Ian Lipkin, an international microbe hunter and a Columbia University research professor, will give a community presentation called Bad Bugs on the Big Screen on Nov. 15 at 7 p.m. at the Hamilton Performing Arts Center, 327 Fairgrounds Road.

The talk is free and open to the public as part of a community outreach series sponsored by Rocky Mountain Laboratories.

Lipkin has helped solve some of the worlds most urgent infectious disease mysteries for decades, and he has worked on projects from West Nile virus in New York to the Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus in Saudi Arabia. He served as a scientific adviser for director Steven Soderberghs film Contagion and trained actress Kate Winslet to play the role of scientist.

The film has been described as one of the most accurate depictions of how an emerging viral disease can rapidly affect health care systems, economies and social behavior, according to RML spokesman Ken Pekoc.

Lipkin impressed upon the filmmakers two important themes: Research programs are vital and scientists have to be prepared for the unexpected.

Contagion provided a rare opportunity for a scientist to take a lifetime of research experiences to a global audience and say, This is what we do, and this is why its important, Dr. Lipkin said in a statement.

RML scientists scientists collaborate with Lipkins research group on various projects, Pekoc said. For example, the researchers are currently sharing expertise to better understand the MERS coronavirus, which was first described in two patients in September 2012. According to the World Health Organization, MERS now has caused disease in 149 people and killed 63.

Ian is probably the only virologist in the world capable of bridging the cutting edge of science to the cutting room floor of Hollywood, said Marshall Bloom, M.D., RML associate director for science. His lecture will not only describe his work, but will chronicle the way infectious disease research has been portrayed on the silver screen. This will be not only informative, but very engaging.

RML is part of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a component of the National Institutes of Health. For more information, visit http://www.niaid.nih.gov.

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Disease expert to speak in Hamilton

Quick with a smile and even faster with a pun, native New Yorker Stephen Morse doesnt seem like a man preoccupied with mass killers.

As a boy he toyed with the idea of becoming an Egyptologist or herpetologist I spent a lot of time trying to catch snakes in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey but eventually he chose microbiology. A lifelong lover of solving puzzles, Morse gravitated toward some of the most mysterious microbes: killer viruses that seemed to strike from out of nowhere, sometimes reaching pandemic levels.

I like intellectual challenges thats probably my greatest weakness, jokes Morse, sitting in his office at Columbia Universitys Mailman School of Public Health, where books, often two or three rows deep, are crammed floor to ceiling.

Morse is credited with creating the term emerging infectious diseases in the late 1980s to explain viruses that can exist for years in an animal host without causing illness. The virus emerges when human activity, such as habitat destruction, causes host-human contact. With the right conditions including transmissibility the virus infects and spreads through our species, sometimes globally.

More than 20 years after he began trying to solve one of epidemiologys biggest challenges understanding why pandemics happen and how we can stop them Morse serves as the director of the U.S. Agency for International Developments worldwide PREDICT project, which has been part of the organizations Emerging Pandemic Threat (EPT) initiative since 2009. The program is multidimensional, from cutting-edge mathematical virus modeling to field educators teaching hunters how to reduce risk of infection from contaminated game.

On a humid New York summer day, in between fielding calls from the State Department and other eminent virologists about expanding PREDICTs efforts into new countries, Morse explained to Discover why preventing pandemic remains an elusive goal.

Continued here:
Trip Wire: Q&A with Epidemiologist Stephen Morse

The first phase of a clinical trial of an antibody therapy that increases a person's chance of surviving the potentially fatal Hendra virus will begin early next year.

The world-first trial will extensively test the safety of the therapy, which is the only known way of treating a person exposed to Hendra.

The human monoclonal antibody will be tested on between 20 and 40 healthy adults.

Queensland's chief health officer Jeanette Young says no side effects are expected.

"We think it's a very, very safe drug but we haven't done the work," she said in Brisbane.

Dr Young says the treatment must be administered within days of exposure for it to be effective.

The antibody has been used to treat a handful of people, but has never been tested extensively on humans.

If the trial is successful, the antibody could be routinely given to those exposed to the virus.

US Hendra expert professor Christopher Broder developed the antibody, which effectively blocks virus particles from entering human cells, hopefully allowing the immune system to fight off the virus.

"We are really excited to see that it might actually be an antibody that is going to save someone's life in the future, which is pretty rare when you consider the severity of someone getting the Hendra virus," he said via video link on Thursday.

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Hendra therapy set for human trial

BRENTWOOD A Hampstead woman is suing Exeter Hospital and other agencies, claiming she became infected with hepatitis C through contact with her husband after he contracted the virus from serial infector David Kwiatkowski while being treated at the hospital.

In a lawsuit filed in Rockingham County Superior Court, Linda Sanborn says her husband, Alden Butch Sanborn, transmitted hepatitis C to her through intimate contact that occurred before they were aware of his infection.

Certainly its a fear of spouses and an understandable one, Linda Sanborns attorney, Paul Kleinman said of the partners of those affected by the hepatitis C outbreak caused by Kwiatkowskis drug diversion scheme while working as a hospital lab technician.

According to the suit, Butch Sanborn was admitted to the hospitals cardiac catheterization lab on Jan. 27, 2012, for a procedure.

The suit said he became infected with hepatitis C through Kwiatkowski, who has admitted that while working at Exeter Hospital he would swap out the pain killer fentanyl by taking a syringe of the drug and replacing it with a syringe containing saline. He would inject the drug and then refill the syringe with saline. The syringes dirty needle was then reused on unsuspecting patients.

Butch Sanborn was diagnosed with hepatitis C, a potentially fatal viral infection of the liver, in late March 2012 after he was admitted to a Boston hospital.

Linda Sanborn was tested for the virus last year, but the test result was negative at the time, according to Kleinman of Bouchard, Kleinman & Wright of Manchester.

What happened was it was one of those situations where the disease hadnt shown up at that point. This was a unique situation and one where it was passed on by someone who had a very, very significant viral load in terms of the disease, Kleinman said Wednesday.

New Hampshire Director of Public Health Dr. Jose Montero said Wednesday he could not discuss any particular patient, but he did confirm that only one person contracted hepatitis C through secondary transmission.

Experts say hepatitis C is transmitted when blood from a person infected with the virus enters the body of someone who is not infected.

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Wife of hepatitis C victim, claiming she's now infected, sues Exeter Hospital