Mortality statistics show 122,000 deaths in excess of normal levels across 14 countries analysed by the FT

Parkinson's disease may start in the gut and spread to the brain, a new study from the University of Surrey suggests.

The Black Death ravaged Europe between 1347 and 1353, killing millions. Plague outbreaks in Europe then continued until the 19th century. One of the most commonly recited facts about plague in Europe was that it was spread by rats. In some parts of the world, the bacterium that causes plague, Yersinia pestis, maintains a long-term presence in wild rodents and their fleas. This is called an animal “reservoir”.

Every time you flush a toilet, it releases plumes of tiny water droplets into the air around you. We used lasers to show how, writes John Crimaldi.

In a matter of weeks – or even days – the UK’s free-range chicken sector is expected to be shut down. Any farms that had been giving their egg-laying hens or chickens access to the outdoors will be forced to keep them locked indoors. While the headlines are that bird flu is back after a surge of outbreaks over the past three weeks and fears of festive goose shortages, the reality is it never really went away.

In 1347, plague first entered the Mediterranean via trade ships transporting goods from the territories of the Golden Horde in the Black Sea. The disease then disseminated across Europe, the Middle East and northern Africa claiming up to 60 percent of the population in a large-scale outbreak known as the Black Death. This first wave further extended into a 500-year-long pandemic, the so-called Second Plague Pandemic, which lasted until the early 19th century.

Monkeypox virus can be shed into the surrounding environment by people who are infected, particularly in shed skin particles and in debris from monkeypox skin lesions and scabs. The virus is

Scientists are working on vaccines that train cells to see tumors as foreign, in hopes of one day making breast cancer preventable.

The pandemic coronavirus' debut wrought universal havoc—not even seasonal flu viruses were spared. Amid travel restrictions, quarantines, closures, physical distancing, masking, enhanced hand washing, and disinfection, the 2020-2021 flu season was all but canceled. That meant not just an unprecedented global decrease in the number of people sick with the flu but also a dramatic collapse in the genetic diversity of circulating flu strains.

A new SARS-CoV-2-like virus discovered in Russian bats is capable of infecting humans, and is resistant to current vaccines against COVID-19, a study has found. A team led by researchers at Washington State University (WSU), US, found spike proteins from the bat virus, named Khosta-2, can infect human cells and is resistant to both the antibody therapies and blood serum from people vaccinated for SARS-CoV-2.

A new method to detect Parkinson’s disease has been determined by analysing sebum with mass spectrometry. The study, published today in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, have found that there are lipids of high molecular weight that are substantially more active in people suffering from Parkinson’s disease.

Since the global pandemic began in 2020, the world has become ever more aware that the health of our species is closely intertwined with other animals. Today, the conversation is mostly focused on birds and mammals, with amphibians rarely considered – but that may be a dangerous oversight.

The findings from 2 large clinical trials—one in the UK and one in Norway—discount the notion that vitamin D supplements protect against COVID-19 or other respiratory-tract infections.

NEW YORK (AP) — The polio virus has been found in New York City’s wastewater in another sign that the disease, which hadn’t been seen in the U.S. in a decade, is quietly spreading among unvaccinated people, health officials said Friday.

Conservationists have called for ministers to ban the release of millions of gamebirds to prevent the UK’s wild birds being wiped out by a “catastrophic” avian flu epidemic this winter. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said there was a significant risk that pheasants, partridge and ducks released for shooting from 1 October could spread avian influenza into wild bird populations, wreaking havoc in farmland and garden birds.

A team of researchers with the University of Oslo has found evidence that suggests human fleas and lice, not rodents, were behind the spread of the plague that killed millions of people over the course of several centuries. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group reports using mathematical models from mortality records to demonstrate how the plague would have spread under different scenarios and what they found by doing so.

A colony of bats was later discovered in the man's Illinois home, and he refused treatment despite the warnings.

Health officials are urging vaccinations against polio after the first US case in a decade was found.

The likelihood of developing a CV is predicted to rise dramatically among minorities while falling among White people.