Between bed bugs, flu viruses and the risk of pulmonary embolism, taking a flight can feel like navigating a minefield. The good news is, there are lots of ways to keep yourself healthy.
MRSA
Q&A: Can We Protect Ourselves from the ‘Superbug’ MRSA?
You’re going to want to wash your hands after you read this post. Author Maryn McKenna, or “Scary Disease Girl,” as she’s known to her colleagues, talks about MRSA — a potentially lethal bug that has jumped from hospitals into …
A sweet solution to antibiotic-resistance?
Amid growing concerns about antibiotic-resistant bacteria, a team of researchers from the Netherlands may be developing a sweet way to fend off harmful bacteria. A new study in the July issue of the FASEB Journal details their research investigating the antimicrobial properties of an ingredient in honey known as defensin-1. Researchers
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Meat and Antibiotics: Getting Our Animals Off Drugs
Over at the Ecocentric blog, I wrote about a new policy direction from the Food and Drug Administration on the use of antibiotics in meat production. Antibiotics—often used for growth promotion and given in the feed of animals—are a major part of America’s meat production. The Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs), the …
More children being hospitalized for MRSA infection
New research published today in the journal Pediatrics finds that the number of children being admitted to the hospital for antibiotic-resistant staph infections has surged dramatically in recent years. As the Associated Press reports, the rate of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus infections (MRSA) grew from 2 per 1,000
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Fear of lawsuits may drive doctors to overuse antibiotics
The growing number of Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections in hospitals may in part be driven by physicians’ tendency to over-prescribe antibiotics to avoid being sued by disgruntled patients, according to a study published this past fall in the American Journal of Therapeutics. Researchers from New York Medical
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