Toots for kakape@mas.to account

Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2025-01-14 at 23:03

Rwanda recently managed a big outbreak with 66 cases incl. 15 deaths (a remarkably low death rate for Marburg and probably due to high standard of care). That outbreak was declared over less than a month ago.

At the time Abdi Rahman Mahamud told me that Marburg outbreaks seemed to be getting more frequent. Are we picking up more outbreaks that would have gone undetected in the past? Is it something in the virus' ecology? Are we driving this? (climate? land use? other factors?)

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2025-01-14 at 23:01

Plus: "The regional risk is considered high due to Kagera region's strategic location as a transit hub, with significant cross-border movement of the population to Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Reportedly, some of the suspected cases are in districts near international borders, highlighting the potential for spread into neighbouring countries."

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2025-01-14 at 23:00

Marburg outbreaks are always concerning. What jumps out here is that the case-fatality rate seems very high, which could signal undetected spread. Plus the spread across two regions and the fact that some suspected cases are healthcare workers are not a good sign either.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2025-01-14 at 22:59

Not good news: WHO just announced a new #Marburg outbreak in Tanzania.

“As of 11 January 2025, nine suspected cases were reported including eight deaths (case fatality ratio (CFR) of 89%) across two districts – Biharamulo and Muleba. Samples from two patients have been collected and tested by the National Public Health Laboratory. Results are pending official confirmation.”

https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news/item/2025-DON552

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-11-13 at 14:47

Wenn ich meinen Freunden in den USA erzähle, dass ich Freitag bei einem Wissenschaftsfestival etwas zu Humor in Infografiken moderiere, schauen die mich an, als hätte ich gerade alles bestätigt, was sie über Deutsche denken.

Aber die kennen ja auch nicht

@katjaberlin ...

https://sidays.com/events/humorvolle-infografiken

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-11-08 at 10:42

Even if the risk of a pandemic appears low for now, the results are another warning that the U.S. needs to do more to bring #H5N1 in cattle under control, says Albert Osterhaus, a virologist at the University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover: “Even a low risk of a looming catastrophe should be tackled at the source.”

https://www.science.org/content/article/many-human-infections-cow-flu-are-going-undetected

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-11-07 at 22:14

Freue mich riesig, dass meine gute Freundin Kerstin Hoppenhaus für ihr tolles Buch "Salze der Erde" den NDR-Sachbuchpreis 2024 gewonnen hat.

Kann es nur jedem empfehlen. Das Buch ist wichtig, interessant und einfach schön zu lesen!

https://www.ndr.de/kultur/buch/sachbuchpreis/NDR-Sachbuchpreis-2024-geht-an-Kerstin-Hoppenhaus,sachbuchpreis650.html

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-31 at 19:08

Final story is up now too. It’s about inoculation, its roots in Cold War psychology research and what if anything we can expect from this and other psychological interventions…

https://www.science.org/content/article/can-people-be-inoculated-against-misinformation

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-31 at 13:17

Second story from my trio on misinformation research covers what I see as the 5 biggest challenges facing the field. It is up here now:

https://www.science.org/content/article/five-biggest-challenges-facing-misinformation-researchers

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-31 at 12:19

“Public health researchers are alarmed, especially given Kennedy’s opposition to vaccines. “I can’t imagine anyone who would be more damaging to vaccines and the use of vaccines than RFK,” University of Minnesota epidemiologist Michael Osterholm told CNN”

https://www.science.org/content/article/researchers-state-panic-after-robert-f-kennedy-jr-says-trump-will-hand-him-health

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-30 at 22:58

A new #Marburg infection reported today in Rwanda. Update only says that it was a known contact of a previously conformed case.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-30 at 16:41

The first story is up now: It’s a look at the work of Kate Starbird and her team, who study rumors at the University of Washington, specifically rumors around the US elections.

https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-election-looms-rumor-researcher-tracks-falsehoods-and-counters-them-real-time

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-30 at 16:40

It’s been an interesting experience in turns fascinating and frustrating and when I went back to full-time science writing earlier this year I decided to try and put at least some of what I’ve learnt into words.

Those stories are coming out this week in

Science Magazine and I will try and do something I haven’t done in a while and delve deeper in a few threads.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-30 at 16:39

I’ve reported on infectious diseases for 15 years, but during the covid-19 pandemic and even more during the global outbreak of mpox clade IIb, I was shocked by the amount of misinformation I was seeing. Misinfo had always been part of any outbreak, but this felt different.

I ended up spending almost a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow to try and understand misinformation/disinformation better, to - I hope - be a better infectious disease journalist.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-28 at 18:42

No news today in Rwanda‘s #Marburg outbreak, which is good news really.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-27 at 16:43

No new #Marburg infection reported today by Rwanda. Case count stands at 65 cases including 15 deaths, 3 patients still in treatment

More than 1500 people have been given Sabin Vaccine Institute’s Marburg vaccine candidate.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-25 at 19:22

  1. The latest case announced yesterday was “linked to the site where the index case was exposed” according to WHO. That is how the announcement by the health ministry sounded yesterday too, but wasn’t completely sure. Would be good to know whether assumption is second spillover.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-25 at 19:22

“It's not yet clear whether the exposure occurred before or after vaccination, and Sabin is working closely with the Rwandan Ministry of Health to gather more details as we continue monitoring her condition and the Marburg outbreak”, Sabin Vaccine Institute writes in a statement.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-25 at 19:22

Some interesting news coming out on the most recent #Marburg cases in Rwanda that I had questions about:

  1. The healthcare worker that was diagnosed this week had indeed been vaccinated with the experimental Sabin vaccine.

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Written by Kai Kupferschmidt on 2024-10-24 at 22:54

One more #Marburg infection in Rwanda today. This time “linked to follow-up on contacts at the site of the index case.” Not sure what that means exactly. Would be good to know more details!

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