Warming weather in the Pacific Northwest brings with it a renewed threat of tick paralysis in animals and people. Tick paralysis is a somewhat uncommon but potentially fatal disease that can affect virtually all warm-blooded land animals. It occurs when certain species of ticks inject potent toxins from their salivary glands into the host animal. […]
PULLMAN — A disease you are suffering today could be a result of your great-grandmother being exposed to an environmental toxin during pregnancy – and you may already have passed it along to your children. That’s the conclusion reached by researchers at Washington State University, who have found that exposure to an environmental toxin during […]
As the cold and flu season approaches, it is important that people remember to wash their hands often. This year it may be especially important as the Center for Disease Control and Prevention predicts 5-20 percent of the population will get the flu this year, with more than 200,000 flu-related hospitalizations and 36,000 deaths (www.cdc.gov/flu). […]
As the cost of health care continues to increase, health insurance coverage is placing more emphasis on preventive health care. “Some of the highest health costs in both financial and human terms are caused by diseases, such as heart disease and cancer,” according to a 2005 study report, “Workplace Visions,” by the Society for Human […]
A Washington State University team is battling Johne ’s (pronounced YO-knees) disease, also known as paratuberculosis, a multibillion-dollar problem in the dairy industry worldwide. Paratuberculosis is a chronic, contagious bowel inflammation that causes persistent and progressive diarrhea, weight loss, debilitation and eventually death. It affects cattle, sheep, goats, llamas, camels, farmed deer and other domestic, […]
Barry Hewlett, an anthropology professor at WSU Vancouver, does not scare easily. Close contact with obscure bacterial infections and tropical diseases with names like river blindness and malaria may be off-putting to some, but Hewlett has traveled to Africa several times over the past 30 years to eagerly investigate many such communal outbreaks. Still, when […]
The Center for Disease Control and the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Feb. 7 approved a new set of regulations regarding the registration, monitoring and purchase of select biological agents and toxins. The new regulations, which apply to Washington State University, expanded the list of substances that must be registered and included hefty fines for […]
The Washington Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (WADDL), in the College of Veterinary Medicine, has received a $750,000 federal appropriation to join a founding network of similar facilities dedicated to homeland security. The funding is part of a U.S. Department of Agriculture plan to share responsibilities for animal disease surveillance and diagnosis with accredited state animal […]