Free Republic

Cases of a 'bone breaking' disease have created an 'emergency situation' in the Americas, a United Nations agency has warned. Jarbas Barbosa, head of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), confirmed more than 5.2 million cases of dengue fever across the Americas this year, a nearly 50 percent jump from the 3.5 million cases the group reported late last month. More than 1,800 people have died from the mosquito-borne viral illness, up from over 1,000 deaths reported last month in the year through March. 'We have an emergency situation,' PAHO Director Jarbas Barbosa said in a press briefing. Barbosa warned...

The owner of the Reedley biolab was/is part of the Chinese Communist Party’s “Military-Civil Fusion” program, and received millions in suspicious dollars from China while stealing American bio-technology, selling unlicensed pregnancy and COVID tests, and squirreling away thousands of vials of deadly pathogens.

I am glad to be alive after a bout with dengue fever. But many across the world are not so fortunate. More than 4000 die each year due to dengue, a severe mosquito-borne disease. It all began 10 days ago with intense fever. My body consistently clocked above 102 degrees Fahrenheit for 48 hours. Then followed severe pain in every part of the body. Once the fever and aching subsided, the second phase of the struggle began, with the blood platelet count falling dramatically. Often, as in my case, the blood platelet count recovers on its own slowly. But in...

Genetically modified mosquitoes have been released for the first time in the United States as part of an experiment to combat insect-borne diseases such as Dengue fever, yellow fever, and the Zika virus. UK-based biotechnology firm Oxitec, which is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, said it released the mosquitoes in six locations in Monroe County’s Florida Keys: two on Cudjoe Key, one on Ramrod Key, and three on Vaca Key. It’s part of an effort to help tackle a disease-transmitting invasive mosquito population—the Aedes aegypti mosquito species—that’s responsible for “virtually all mosquito-borne diseases transmitted to humans,” according...

KEY LARGO, Fla. — An 11th case of the mosquito-borned dengue fever has been confirmed in the Florida Keys, health officials said. So far, all 11 cases have been in Key Largo, including 8 cases the last week of June, the Florida Department of Health officials said Tuesday. Officials are “currently conducting epidemiological studies to determine the origin and extent of these infections,” Florida Keys spokeswoman Alison Kerr told the Miami Herald. The latest patient has been treated and is expected to make a complete recovery, Kerr said. Health department officials believe all of the cases were locally acquired, the...

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Miami-Dade County now has 14 cases of confirmed dengue fever this year. The Florida Department of Health in Miami-Dade County issued a mosquito-borne illness alert Monday afternoon after two Miami-Dade residents came down with symptoms. The latest cases were locally acquired and are linked to a travel-related case previously reported, according to the DOH-Miami-Dade. Dengue is spread through mosquito bites through the Aedes mosquitoes which also spread chikungunya and the Zika virus. Though rarely fatal, those that develop symptoms recover in about a week.

The latest updates meant nine of the local cases either live on or had visited the island of Cheung Chau, while the remaining 17 had gone to the popular Lion Rock Park or Wong Tai Sin, the district where the park is located, since the first case was reported on August 14. Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung Kin-chung said on Sunday hygiene officials would go to Cheung Chau starting Monday to spray insecticide around all homes and schools, before the new academic year begins on September 3. Workers had already been doing this within 500 metres of each Cheung Chau patient’s...

Florida health officials who have been testing thousands of residents for Zika virus said Wednesday they found another infection: dengue virus. The health department said it confirmed a case of locally acquired dengue virus, the second this year in the state and the first in Miami. Dengue is a close relative of Zika and it is spread by the same mosquitoes. Health experts say anywhere you find dengue, you are likely to find Zika. It's so closely related that tests often mix up the two viruses, as well as a third relative: chikungunya. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention...

MIAMI (CBSMiami) — Florida health officials have confirmed the first case of locally acquired Dengue fever in Miami-Dade County. The infection is primarily spread through bites of infected mosquitoes. The person infected with the virus has already received medical treatment and is expected to make a full recovery. Health officials are investigating close contacts around the person to make sure more people are not infected. Miami-Dade Mosquito Control says they are conducting aggressive mosquito control efforts in the area of concern. Dengue fever can present itself as a flu-like illness with muscle aches, pain, fever and sometimes a rash. The...

An experimental vaccine against the dengue virus has been found to protect 100 percent of recipients in a clinical trial carried out by the USA's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). In the NIAID trial 21 people were vaccinated with TV003, while 20 received a placebo. Six months later they returned to be infected with a mild version of dengue-2. All 21 people who'd received the vaccine were protected against infection. All 20 members of the placebo group contracted dengue. A modified version of the vaccine is now being developed in an attempt to treat the related Zika virus....

The buzz is that everyone is at risk for contracting the mosquito-borne Zika virus. Why not? Since the successful effort to “democratize” HIV/AIDS in the 1980s as a threat to everyone, everywhere, every major disease outbreak has been presented as a worldwide threat. (Ebola’s gotten that treatment three times now.) But no. Despite admonitions from the public health agencies and headlines like the Washington Post’s “Why The United States Is So Vulnerable to the Alarming Spread of Zika Virus,” and despite President Obama’s request to Congress for $1.8 billion to fight the disease, Zika has little chance of spreading from...

The Zika virus ravaging South America causes horrific problems including birth defects and creeping paralysis. And now it has made its way to 16 US states. There is no vaccine. With the Zika virus declared an international public health emergency a few weeks ago by the World Health Organization, it seems a good time to remind people of another mosquito borne disease with even more horrible effects--malaria. [...] You see, malaria was eliminated in the West and North because of the invention, and use, of the miracle pesticide DDT. DDT could stop Zika, just as it stopped malaria. For that...

Experts warn that we should be prepared for more dengue in the US and around the world. ‘Hawaii is a piece of a much bigger phenomenon that’s happening globally,’ says Dr. Peter Hotez at Baylor College of Medicine. It’s peak tourism season in Hawaii, and the state’s Department of Health has issued a warning for visitors and residents: dengue fever is spreading on the Big Island. More than 150 people on Hawaii Island have been infected with the mosquito-borne virus.

A little-known virus is causing a big fuss in Micronesia, the Pacific island nation partly managed by the United States. The Zika virus, spread by mosquitoes, produces an itchy rash, pinkeye, joint pain and fever. Since its discovery 60 years ago in an ill monkey in the Zika forest in Uganda, it has caused rare cases and outbreaks in Africa and Southeast Asia. There is no specific treatment or vaccine. Now Zika has made its first appearance in Micronesia, on the island of Yap, where health officials say there have been at least 42 confirmed cases and 65 probable ones....

The state Dept. of Health confirmed on Monday, Nov. 30, that there were 112 cases of dengue fever on Hawaii Island, up five from Friday, Nov. 27. Officials say 98 residents and 14 visitors were affected by the locally acquired disease. Eighty-six cases involved adults and 26 have been children (under 18 years of age). All are recovering, officials said. The onset of illness ranges between Sept. 11 through Nov. 20, 2015. As of Monday, a total of 262 reported potential cases have been excluded based on test results and/or not meeting case criteria. ... Health officials say while the...

A federal judge in California has ruled that the Obama administration’s detention of children and their mothers who were caught crossing the border illegally is a serious violation of a longstanding court settlement, and that the families should be released as quickly as possible. In a decision late Friday roundly rejecting the administration’s arguments for holding the families, Judge Dolly M. Gee of Federal District Court for the Central District of California found that two detention centers in Texas that the administration opened last summer fail to meet minimum legal requirements of the 1997 settlement for facilities housing children. -snip-...

Dengue hemorrhagic fever has been added to the list of diseases brought by the surge of “unaccompanied minors” who have illegally entered the U.S. this year. “The big picture here is that we are getting all these diseases brought into the United States by the ‘imported disease people’ from Latin America,” Dr. Lee Hieb, past president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, explained to WND in an interview. Other diseases tied to illegal aliens include Chagas disease, Enterovirus D-68, drug-resistant tuberculosis and malaria.

The immigration policies of the Obama administration and the democrats in Congress have opened the door to another disease, Dengue hemorrhagic fever that is now showing up in the U.S., Jerome R. Corsi of WND reported on Tuesday. With the influx of unaccompanied illegal minors who have illegally entered the U.S. this year, Dr. Lee Hieb, past president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, explained to WND in an interview that the U.S is now facing another deadly disease. Hieb told Corsi, “The big picture here is that we are getting all these diseases brought into the United...

In an alarming development, an aggressive mosquito capable of transmitting the deadly dengue hemorrhagic fever and other serious diseases was reportedly found in San Diego, California, for the first time this week. Many of the viruses the mosquito can spread are endemic to Central America and Mexico. Known as yellow fever mosquitoes, or by its scientific name the Aedes aegypti, the insects were found in offices at San Diego’s 32nd Street Naval Station, the Los Angeles Times reported. The same kind of mosquitoes were found Oct. 7 and Oct. 8 in the Los Angeles-area counties of Commerce and Pico Rivera....

The hordes of illegal immigrant minors entering the U.S. are bringing serious diseases—including swine flu, dengue fever, Ebola virus and tuberculosis—that present a danger to the American public as well as the Border Patrol agents forced to care for the kids, according to a U.S. Congressman who is also medical doctor. This has created a “severe and dangerous” crisis, says the Georgia lawmaker, Phil Gingrey. Most of the Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) are coming from Central America and they’re importing infectious diseases considered to be largely eradicated in this country. Additionally, many of the migrants lack basic vaccinations such as...