Anopheles stephensi, a species of mosquito native to Southeast Asia, is finding its way to Africa. Unlike Anopheles gambiae, the species native to Africa, Anopheles stephensi can breed in tiny amounts of water year-round and has made a comfortable home in urban areas. It’s also a remarkably adept spreader of malaria in places and to extents not normally seen in places across the continent. In an extended episode of Malaria Minute, a podcast from the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute, guest host Thomas Locke discusses how researchers are tracking stephensi and how the invasive species could complicate efforts to control the disease in Africa. Learn more: www.who.int/teams/global-malaria-programme/prevention/vector-control/global-databases-on-invasive-mosquito-vector-species

708 - Invasive Anopheles stephensi Could Redefine the Epidemiology of Malaria in Africa

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More than a decade after electronic cigarettes became broadly available in the United States, their merits are still being debated. Do these products help people quit smoking? How serious are the health risks associated with these products? In a two-part series, we hear from two researchers in tobacco control about their views. In part one, Dr. Nancy Rigotti, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about the use of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation. Read her editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2314977

755 - Electronic Cigarettes Part 1: Do E-cigs Help People Quit Smoking?

Virologist Dr. Andy Pekosz and public health veterinary expert Dr. Meghan Davis return to the podcast to talk with Stephanie Desmon about what we’ve learned so far from viral sequencing of H5N1, its presence in milk, what we know about infections in humans, the status of the overall response to a major pathogen of concern on the heels of COVID-19, and more. Read Dr. Davis’s recent New York Times essay on protecting the dairy workforce here: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/01/opinion/bird-flu-dairy-workers.html

BONUS - An Update on Bird Flu in the U.S.

An alarming and dangerous syphilis surge across the Great Plains Region, an area spanning North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa, has prompted tribal officials to urge HHS Secretary to declare a public health emergency. Dr. Meghan Curry O’Connell, chief public health officer at the Great Plains Tribal Leaders Health Board and a member of the Cherokee Nation, talks with Lindsay Smith Rogers about the outbreak and why public health officials are struggling to respond. Learn more: https://www.greatplainstribalhealth.org/news/tribal-leaders-urge-hhs-secretary-to-declare-syphilis-emergency-189.html https://www.vox.com/24006120/south-dakota-syphilis-congenital-indigenous-tribal-native-american-meghan-oconnell-health-board

754 - A Public Health Emergency: Syphilis Surges in the Great Plains Region

In part two of a two-part series about the crisis of health care for immigrants and refugees at the U.S.-Mexico border, Dr. Alexander Tenorio, a neurosurgical resident at the University of California, San Diego, talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about the influx of traumatic brain and spinal injuries his team has seen from people attempting to climb the border wall. They discuss the scope of the problem and the policies behind it, and why it often takes hours for victims to get critical care. They also talk about Dr. Tenorio’s personal connection to the situation as a first-generation American born to Mexican immigrants.

753 - The Health Care Crisis At the U.S.-Mexico Border Part 2: Border Walls and Traumatic Brain and Spinal Injuries

In part one of a two-part series about the crisis of health care for immigrants and refugees at the U.S.-Mexico border, Dr. Janine Young, a pediatrician at the University of California, San Diego, talks with Stephanie Desmon about the tenuous situation for children and families. More and more people are showing up at the border in poor health—dehydrated, malnourished, some severely injured and many traumatized—without any adequate care to meet them. They talk about the immigration policies that have led to a system ill-equipped to properly triage and treat the children and families seeking refuge in the U.S., and the misconceptions around people who are fleeing for their lives.

708 - Invasive Anopheles stephensi Could Redefine the Epidemiology of Malaria in Africa

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