China
Africa
Explore chapters and articles related to this topic
Biological Terrorist Agents
Published in Robert A. Burke, Counter-Terrorism for Emergency Responders, 2017
Two laboratories in the world still hold the last-known stocks of variola virus: the CDC in Atlanta and VECTOR in Novizbersk, Russia. Clandestine stocks could exist in other parts of the world but are as yet unknown. If they do exist, smallpox could come into the hands of terrorists and be used as a biological weapon. The WHO's governing body recommended the total destruction of the remaining stockpiles by 1999. Unfortunately, that did not happen. An effective vaccination is available for smallpox and has been used for years for the general population. Since it is primarily a children's disease, vaccinations were given during early childhood and were effective for about 10 years. Vaccination of civilians in the United States was discontinued in the early 1980s, although some military forces vaccinated until 1989 may still retain some immunity. Children, who are no longer vaccinated, would be at great risk from exposure to smallpox. The Japanese government considered using smallpox as a biological weapon during World War II, and the virus has been considered a threat to U.S. military forces for many years. Monkeypox and cowpox are closely related to variola and might be genetically manipulated to produce a smallpox-like virus.
Common Sense Emergency Response
Published in Robert A. Burke, Common Sense Emergency Response, 2020
Other health care workers became sick while in Africa and were flown to the USA for treatment. One of the facilities that received Ebola patients was the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) in Omaha, Nebraska (Figure 4.148). UNMC has a ten-bed biocontainment unit which is designed and was commissioned in 2005 by the United States Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to provide first-line treatment for people affected by bioterrorism or extremely infectious naturally occurring diseases such as EVD. The facility in Omaha is the largest of its kind in the United States. Highly contagious and deadly infectious conditions that can be handled in the unit include SARS, smallpox, tularemia, plague, EVD, and other hemorrhagic fevers, monkeypox, vancomycin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (VRSA), and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. Safety measures are built into the biocontainment unit including air handling equipment, high-level filtration, and ultraviolet light, that prevent microorganisms from spreading beyond patient rooms. The entire bio unit is isolated from the rest of the hospital with its own ventilation system and secured access. A dunk tank is provided for laboratory specimens, and a pass-through autoclave are also in place to ensure that hazardous infections are contained. Also in the unit is a special sterilizer for laundry so that contaminated bed clothing is not removed from the unit. Patients are flown into Omaha’s Eppley Airfield and transported to the UNMC Bio Unit, in an individual isolation unit also called a BIOPOD, by Omaha Fire Department EMS (Figure 4.149). Biocontainment unit staff receive specialized training and participate in drills throughout the year.
Non-Photocatalytic and Photocatalytic Inactivation of Viruses Using Antiviral Assays and Antiviral Nanomaterials
Published in Devarajan Thangadurai, Saher Islam, Charles Oluwaseun Adetunji, Viral and Antiviral Nanomaterials, 2022
Suman Tahir, Noor Tahir, Tajamal Hussain, Zubera Naseem, Muhammad Zahid, Ghulam Mustafa
Ag NPs as antiviral candidates have been studied versus numerous viruses; for example, monkeypox virus (MPV), respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), HBV, and HSV (Rai et al. 2016). In antiviral treatments, Ag NPs are novel agents. Ag NPs are supposed to inhibit virus development as they target all parts of the virus. Table 7.2 provides the antiviral activities of Ag NPs for numerous viruses. For understanding antiviral action of Ag NPs contrary to viruses, important efforts have been offered involving RSV (Sun et al. 2008), human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV-1) (Lara et al. 2010), MPV (Rogers et al. 2008), HBV (Lu et al. 2008), herpes simplex virus type-1 (HSV-1) (Baram‐Pinto et al. 2010), and tacaribe virus (TCRV) (Speshock et al. 2010). The utilisation of Ag NPs contrary to HIV-1 was investigated and observed that Ag NPs exhibited dimension-based connections with the HIV-1 (Elechiguerra et al. 2005). Similarly, chitosan (Ch) based Ag NPs composites were synthesised to investigate their antiviral action on the influenza A virus H1N1 (Mori et al. 2013). Antiviral action of Ag/Ch composite was estimated through comparison with TCID50 value of the influenza A virus H1N1 with and deprived of Ch-based Ag NPs. Higher content of Ag NPs exhibited efficient antiviral action; however, with chitosan, no antiviral action was noticed. A novel Ag NPs-modified protocol for the assessment of cytotoxic and antiviral characteristics of Ag NPs was developed versus HIV-1 (Trefry and Wooley 2012). The three various sizes (13, 33, and 46 nm) of Ag NPs were synthesised and tannic acid was used as a capping and reducing agent (Orlowski et al. 2014). The prepared Ag NPs were efficient on the mice model of HSV-2 contagion. Ag NPs utilising curcumin as capping and reducing agents were prepared to examine their antiviral action on RSV (Yang et al. 2016). Curcumin-based Ag NPs repressed RSV before entering to cells. The studies have shown that Ag NPs are active antiviral candidates. Though, as stated by some Ag NPs antiviral investigations, an antiviral mechanism can be elucidated, as explained below.
Equilibrium analysis for an epidemic model with a reservoir for infection
Published in Letters in Biomathematics, 2018
Istvan Lauko, Gabriella Pinter, Rachel Elizabeth TeWinkel
In this paper we consider an epidemic model motivated by monkeypox, an emerging disease that has become more prevalent recently in several areas of Africa (Bhunu & Mushayabasa, 2011; Bhunu, Mushayabasa, & Hyman, 2012; Damon, 2011; Hammarlund et al., 2005; Hutin et al., 2001; Kantele, Chickering, Vapalahti, & Rimoin, 2016; Levine, Townsend, Carroll, Damon, & Reynolds, 2007; McCollum & Damon, 2014; The Center for Food Security and Public Health, 2013). It is believed that the noticeable increase in monkeypox (Nolen et al., 2016) is linked to the decrease in herd immunity to smallpox (Hutin et al., 2001; Levine et al., 2007; Lloyd-Smith et al., 2009; McCollum & Damon, 2014) due to the phasing out of smallpox vaccinations (Nolen et al., 2016; Rimoin & Graham, 2011; Rimoin et al., 2007, 2010). Hosts of the monkeypox virus include prairie dogs, tree squirrels, chimpanzees, and baboons, but the complete list of pathogen hosts is not known (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015; Reynolds et al., 2013; The Center for Food Security and Public Health, 2013; World Health Organization, 2016). Monkeypox infects both humans and animals, and is generally considered impossible to eradicate (Damon, 2011; Kantele et al., 2016; McCollum & Damon, 2014; Reynolds et al., 2013; Rimoin & Graham, 2011). Humans become infected with the monkeypox virus when they come into direct contact with infected animals or other humans (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015; Hammarlund et al., 2005; Jezek, Arita, Mutombo, & Szczeniowski, 1986; Jezek, Grab, Szczeniowski, Paluku, & Mutombo, 1988; The Center for Food Security and Public Health, 2013; Weaver & Isaacs, 2009; World Health Organization, 2016). Since human-animal cross-infection usually occurs when humans hunt and eat animals, we can assume that animals do not become infected via contact with the human population, but that animals can infect humans (Reynolds et al., 2013). This creates an asymmetric disease transmission between the animal and human populations, and we can effectively treat the animal population as a reservoir for the disease within which disease dynamics are independent from the disease's course in the human population. Monkeypox was explicitly modelled by Bhunu and Mushayabasa and Bhunu, Mushayabasa and Hyman with traditional SIR models in both the animal and human population, and with standard incidence for disease transmission (Bhunu & Mushayabasa, 2011; Bhunu et al., 2012). However, the analysis presented in Bhunu and Mushayabasa (2011) and Bhunu et al. (2012) is not complete, and here we present an alternative full equilibrium analysis for the first model by Bhunu and Mushayabasa, and establish global stability of the endemic equilibrium in both populations under suitable conditions on the parameters (Bhunu & Mushayabasa, 2011). We utilize the theory developed by Markus (1956) and later by Thieme and Castillo-Chavez (Castillo-Chavez & Thieme, 1994; Thieme, 1992) for asymptotically autonomous systems together with the techniques of identifying suitable Lyapunov functions for SIR models with standard incidence described by Vargas-De-León (2011).