On the Italian coastline, overlooking the shimmering calm of the Adriatic Sea, I’ve been catching up with an old friend whilst finally having chance to immerse into Garcia’s Love in the Time of Cholera. Her heart for Brazil and love for all health issues regarding Mother and Child, combined with my own intrigue for emerging viruses, has led us to discuss the inevitable. The Zika Virus.
Read more
Since it was first picked up 3 years ago, MERS-Coronavirus has gone global. During my short trip to the Philippines, I don full protective gear as I’m given the chance to see suspected cases up close and personal. We still don’t know where it came from, nor do we have any medicines to treat it.
Read more
Hand, Food and Mouth Disease cases have boomed in SE Asia to phenomenally high levels. It’s a growing and emerging threat to the health of infants.
Read more
The family, filoviridae, of which the virus in question belongs, allows us to conjure up an image of the perpetrator; after all, the Latin filum alludes to its’ filamentous structure. A hidden threadlike set of molecules indeed. All filoviruses that have caused disease in humans have been endemic to sub-Saharan Africa only and it is here, in West Africa to be more
Read more
Settling into a recent Vietnamese breakfast ritual of mine, which I’m swiftly becoming accustomed to, of ‘Pho’ and ‘Bahn My’ accompanied by the beast of an engine starter that is “cà phê sữa đá”, I open up my e-mails to some worrying news. A colleague at the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit – Jackie – had sent me a link
Read more
Can a virus make your brain bigger? Well yes – quite literally so when we’re talking about Viral Encephalitis. A couple of case studies I’ve encountered on my journeys pushed me to find out more about this intriguing medical scenario. Viral encephalitis is a very worrying (clinically speaking) disease manifestation whereby your brain and central nervous system tissues swell up.
Read more
Maybe. Just maybe. My colleague here at OUCRU has some preliminary results indicating that a hantavirus, most commonly found in rodents and able to cause haemorrhagic diseases (brutal!), is present within the Viet Nam Bat population. We’ll need clarification. But bloody hell – this is exciting. A hantavirus in a Bat is a RARE find. Nice work Meredith. More on
Read more
I’m two weeks into life in Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam. The food, as previously assured by friends who have visited in earlier times, is scrumptious. The heat – just what the Doctor ordered. The air leaves a lot wanting here, if I am honest, but its a big city. What else to expect? The reason for my touchdown
Read more
Philandtropical 