Worm infections are often associated with low and middle income countries, but mounting evidence suggests that intestinal parasites are found in some United States communities. In some areas, like this unincorporated community in Texas, over 15% of people had antibodies to threadworms.
In this post, Krisztian Magori summarizes the results of a recently published, long-term study on the ecology of a rare tick-borne pathogen, Borrelia miyamotoi, in New York State.
Malaria continues to be a global challenge to population health, and the scale of the problem is driven by a lack of trained personnel and equipment to speed up diagnostic processes in resource-limited settings. The development of applications and processes to automate malaria diagnosis may circumvent this hurdle, allowing for more rapid treatment of patients.
Evidence of shared immunodominance between Plasmodium falciparum and SARS-CoV-2 may explain low COVID-19 incidence in the malaria-endemic belt of Africa, and could highlight SARS-CoV-2’s ability to infect red blood cells.
The prospect of eliminating a parasitic disease afflicting humans took a leap forward in 2020, despite restrictions caused by a global pandemic.