ZIKA

Authors: Ruiz-Burga E, Bruijning-Verhagen P, Palmer P, Sandcroft A, Fernandes G, de Hoog M, Bryan L, Pierre R, Bailey H, Giaquinto C, Thorne C, Christie CDC, ZIKAction Consortium

Published in: JMIR Formative Research

Authors: A Lue, M Richards-Dawson, G Gordon-Strachan, S Kodilinye, J Dunkley Thompson, T James-Powell, C Pryce, C Mears, J Anzinger, K Webster-Kerr and C Christie

Published in: Frontiers in Medicine

The great expansion of mobile technology across the globe has facilitated the use of smartphone applications to improve health systems and engage people in public health processes. This approach has been specially applied in low and middle income countries where capitalizing on the ubiquity of mobile technology infrastructure can help to overcome widespread health system barriers such as health personnel shortages, cost of health service, and transportation. Mobile health (mHealth) is a growing field with several applications in maternal and child health programmes dedicated to health monitoring,

The WHO is calling on the public to share their comments on the newly drafted Zika virus Research and Development (R&D) Roadmap, a key component of the WHO’s R&D Blueprint which is a global strategy and preparedness plan that allows the activation of R&D activities in advance of and during pandemics. Comments can be submitted by completing this form. The Zika virus R&D roadmap aims to accelerate the development and implementation of effective medical countermeasures for the Zika virus so as to reduce morbidity,

The ZIKAHOST study aims to describe the Zika virus (ZIKV) infection taking into account the host, in this case humans, instead of the pathogen, which would be the zika virus, and we search for biomarkers of the increased likelihood of developing the disease, diagnosis and prognosis through a genomic approach. What this means is that we look at DNA to see if we could understand if patients can be genetically predisposed to develop typical ZIKV effects.

Authors: A E Ades, Elizabeth B Brickley, Neal Alexander, David Brown, Thomas Jaenisch, Demócrito de Barros Miranda-Filho, Moritz Pohl, Kerstin D Rosenberger, Antoni Soriano-Arandes , Claire Thorne et al.

Published in: BMJ Journals

Abstract: 

Authors: A E Ades, Antoni Soriano-Arandes, Ana Alarcon, Francesco Bonfante, Claire Thorne, Catherine S Peckham, Carlo Giaquinto

Published in: The Lancet

Authors: Giovanetti M, Faria NR, Lourenco J, et al.

Published in:  Cell Rep. 2020;30(7):2275-2283

Abstract Zika virus (ZIKV) has caused an explosive epidemic linked to severe clinical outcomes in the Americas. As of June 2018, 4,929 ZIKV suspected infections and 46 congenital syndrome cases had been reported in Manaus,

ZIKAction Consortium will be presenting preliminary results of its vertical transmission study at the 3rd International Conference on Zika Virus and Aedes related infections that will be held in Washington DC, USA, from 13th to 16th February 2020.

The conference aims to bring together physicians, public health practitioners and researchers to address challenges that Zika and Aedes related infections pose around the globe and try to fill knowledge gaps that still remain,

Authors: Gray ER, Heaney J, Ferns RB, Sequeira PC, Nastouli E, Garson JA

Published in: J Virol Methods. 2019;268:17-23

Abstract Dengue is a vector-transmitted viral infection that is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in humans worldwide, with over 50 million apparent cases and a fatality rate of 2.5 % of 0.5 million severe cases per annum in recent years.

The PAHO/WHO Collaborating Centre for the Study of Dengue and its Control of the Institute of Tropical Medicine “Pedro Kourí”/MINSAP, the Cuban Society of Microbiology and Parasitology, the Cuban Ministry of Public Health and PAHO/WHO have announced the 16th International Course on Dengue, Zika and Other Emergent Arboviruses. It will be held in Havana, Cuba from 12 – 23 August 2019.

Participants will include medical doctors,

Authors: Soriano-Arandes A, Rivero-Calle I, Nastouli E, et al.

Published in: Expert Rev Anti Infect Ther. 2018;16(3):243-254

Introduction: Zika virus (ZIKV) infection has caused the most challenging worldwide infectious epidemic outbreak in recent months. ZIKV causes microcephaly and other congenital malformations. There is a need to perform updated systematic reviews on ZIKV infection periodically because this epidemic is bringing up new evidence with extraordinary speed.

On November 7^th, 2017, the Ethics Committee of the Universidad Central del Ecuador formally approved the ZIKAction Congenital Microcephaly Case-Control Study protocol. This prospective study, focused on estimating the risk of congenital microcephaly associated with Zika virus, dengue or chikungunya infection, will be led by Dra. Greta Miño from Hospital del Niño Francisco Icaza Bustamante of Guayaquil and Dr. Toni Soriano from University Hospital Vall d’Hebron in Barcelona as co-lead of the ZIKA-PED work package.

On November 2nd-3rd, the ZIKAction Consortium met for its annual general meeting, which was held at the Emerging Pathogens Institute at the University of Florida.

About 70 scientists from 18 countries attended this two-day meeting, which was an outstanding opportunity to assess the work done so far and to explore future perspective for collaboration.

It was memorable to have Mario Monti, Former EU Commissioner and Prime Minister of Italy between 2011-2013 among our speakers.

Authors: Harrison L, Ananworanich J, Hamadache D, et al; on Behalf of the Paediatric European Network for Treatment of AIDS (PENTA) 11 Trial Team

Published in: AIDS Behav. 2013;17(1):193-202.

Abstract There have been no paediatric randomised trials describing the effect of planned treatment interruptions (PTIs) of antiretroviral therapy (ART) on adherence, or evaluating acceptability of such a strategy.