Personally, I find this article pretty disturbing: Iowa City VA patients not told about bacteria problem. Basically, the story is, that the bacterium that causes Legionnaires disease (Legionella pneumophila) has been found in the water system at a VA hospital in Iowa. And the managers of the hospital say “But they said they’ve been able to control the …
N. b. Should it appear presumptuous, I was publicly prompted to write this. I loathe to link to the original post by Locwin, but must for my response to make sense. A recent blog post (Sept 22, 2014; accessed Sept 24, 2014) by Ben Locwin addresses in the title and first line a study in Nature (Suez …
Join Dr. Rob Knight for a Reddit AMA tomorrow, September 17, 10-11:30am MT. This will be a great opportunity to ask one of the foremost microbiome researchers in the world about anything and everything related to the human microbiome, the American Gut Project, the Earth Microbiome Project, and, well, anything you can think of related …
Over dinner the other night, a friend brought up ongoing public health efforts to get people to stop washing raw chicken because it spreads Campylobacter onto kitchen surfaces. I have to confess that I have been washing, drying and salting a raw chicken nearly once a week for years, following Judy Roger’s (Zuni Cafe) fabulous recipe …
I just stumbled across a NY Times article about a children’s book by Nicola Davies by the title Tiny Creatures: The World of Microbes. The article and the quotes from the book make me both excited and optimistic for how microbes are portrayed. A huge problem I have found in talking to non-microbiologists about microbiology is …
Well, I guess I do not really know what to think about this article by Jane Brody in the New York Times: Don’t Catch What Ails Your House Why do I not know what to think about this? Well I guess here are some of the things I am pondering: 1. The article gives the impression …
Think hotel rooms are gross? An elegant study led by Jack Gilbert, published Thursday in Science Reports, suggests that our resident microbes could help ease our minds on this issue, as they very quickly populate hotel rooms (and houses, more on that below) to make our hotels microbiologically identical to our homes within 24 hours. …
Well, just saw this: Gadget Lust: Keeping the Germs (and the Hypochondria) at Bay. I know this article is partly an attempt to be funny (which I think it succeeded at) but even so, the level of germophobia is pretty astonishing. Actually, though I cringe at germophobia many of the things discussed in this article are perhaps …
Oh my. This story is littlered with so much over the top germophobia I do not know where to begin: The Dirt on Your Sponge – NYTimes.com. The story, by Penelope Green, discusses how Tod Maitland and Matthew Flannery have developed a sponge cleaning system called “SpongeBath”. This is going on sale on Amazon and Bed Bath and …
For anyone looking for another reason to fear hospitals, nosocomial infections (hospital acquired infections), or spinal injections, here is a story for you. Contaminated spinal injections were given to patients in 20 states and led to 751 individuals developing fungal meningitis and 64 deaths. FDA and CDC officials conducted a preliminary investigation and discovered a …