Public Health

Health officials in Minnesota are reportedly tracking a tuberculosis outbreak with seven confirmed cases and a possible eighth across three counties, ABC affiliate KSTP reported Aug. 9.

With hospitals reporting packed emergency rooms and halted surgeries as parts of the nation swelter, the HHS launched the first national dashboard to track heat-related illnesses Aug. 9. 

Some experts are concerned that new COVID-19 shots that would be more effective at preventing severe disease from current circulating strains than the existing bivalent booster won't be ready soon enough. 

COVID-19 hospitalizations in the U.S. are ticking up again, albeit from record lows. There were 9,056 new admissions for the week ending July 29, marking a 12.5 percent jump from the previous week. 

Fungal infections have been on the rise since COVID-19's inception, but public health tracking tools, tests, and data systems in the U.S. are not quite where they need to be yet, Tom Chiller, MD, CDC's head of mycotic diseases, told…

A man bitten by a stray cat in the U.K. developed an infection from a bacterial species that wasn't present in any DNA database, researchers reported in a case study published in the August edition of Emerging Infectious Diseases. 

A variant the World Health Organization and CDC began tracking in mid-July, XBB-offshoot EG.5, became the dominant COVID-19 variant in the first week of August, according to CDC data.

New COVID-19 shots targeting omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 are slated to be ready in September. That strain only accounts for about 10 percent of U.S. cases, though experts say other circulating strains are similar enough to XBB.1.5 that the new shots…

Health officials in Missouri are warning the public about a risk of possible measles exposure at three different locations — including at Barnes Jewish Hospital, an urgent care clinic and a fitness center in the greater St. Louis region in late…

A new TikTok trend that promotes the use of castor oil for improved eyesight and reduced wrinkles has ophthalmologists concerned, NBC News reported Aug. 5.