The World Bank is launching a dedicated pandemics $ 500 million is automatically activated PEF rahaitusvälineen Pandemic Emergency Financing Facility, which covers the countries are trying to prevent the spread of disease uncontrollable. The Fund decided to finance ministers of the G7 meeting in Sendai, Japan. The new financial instrument aims to reduce the risk of a new, potentially more dangerous Ebolaakin disease would spread around the world before scientists ennättäisivät to come up with the vaccine. For the first time we will have a system that can transfer the funds and teams of professionals outbreak before the disease starts to spread uncontrollably, "says World Bank President Jim Yong Kim. "Pandemics constitute one of the greatest threats to humans and animals as taulouksille." PEF take advantage of its funding reinsurance company.

At Chalmers Ventures, we work to connect the right people together, provide input to create value and ensure that there is money to create action. Quite simply a machine for more growth. What behavior can withstand you really? Which tech celebrity would you absolutely not celebrate Midsummer / Christmas with? It's great fun to watch, but I think he's awfully tough to hang out with! Old, happy, close to my family and in my step.

How to join the networkUPS recently entered into a partnership with Zipline, a medical drone delivery startup, to begin aerial transport of healthcare supplies in Rwanda.Included in the deal is Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, a Gates Foundation supported non-profit specializing in immunizations.Investors include Sequoia Capital, Google Ventures, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, and Paul Willard–a former aerodynamics engineer now at Subtraction Capital.The digital database and mobile phones allowed people to know when someone needed help, but the other half of the system—medical supplies and transport infrastructure to get them there—was missing, said Rinaudo.This mirrors South Africa s recent passage of commercial drone legislation covered here at TechCrunch , which regulates the sector under the country s Civil Aviation Authority and created special drone Commercial Operating Licenses.They shave simpler airspaces, smaller and more innovative governments, and can actually implement modern regulator practices faster.

And who gets to define the borderlands and boundaries of what we define as normal?What are the axes upon which we want to divide ourselves?Mukherjee and Crow engaged in a rapid back-and-forth that crossed centuries and academic disciplines and covered Mukherjee s family history of mental illness, the eugenics movement, the Nazis, the genetic engineering of wheat, science education, the maker movement as applied to genetics, the human fantasy of perfection and the personal histories of Gregor Mendel and Charles Darwin.We need to consider how wrong we ve been in the past.One of the purposes is emancipation from disease, replied Mukherjee, before rattling off the transformative impact of the language of genes on our health, from vaccine development to the treatment of breast cancer.Mukherjee said he didn t think the U.S. ever would have state-sanctioned eugenics.

Australia, Germany and the US have been immunising children against the varicella zoster virus for more than a decade, but the success of these initiatives is hard to pin down.Now Kevin Bakker of the University of Michigan and his colleagues have found that between 2004 and 2015, Google searches for chickenpox fell in various countries once they began immunising against it The effect of immunisation was best seen in Germany, says Bakker.There was a reduction in searches each time the government expanded its chickenpox vaccination measures, after both the first and second dose.When the team compared the search data with clinical cases, they found a clear correlation, showing that such searches are good indicator of disease rates.Google Trends is instantaneous, meaning I can look to see what the most popular searches are this morning, anywhere in the world, he says.Search engine trends can also provide more in-depth information about disease outbreaks because they don t just cover people who actively seek medical attention from a doctor or hospital, says Vasileios Lampos of University College London.

Although changes in brain chemistry have been linked to Alzheimer s, scientists have yet to determine an exact cause, let alone a cure.But prevention may be in sight thanks to the work of researchers from Harvard Medical School, Dr. Rudolph Tanzi and Dr. Robert Moir, reports New Scientist.Collections of plaque made from a sticky protein called beta amyloid has previously been correlated with Alzheimer s, and led some scientists to think that the build-up may inhibit cell-to-cell signaling or trigger inflammation that causes immune system cells to attack surrounding cells.For example, as beta amyloid s sticky plaque collects and kills bacteria, it also causes inflammation and blockages when the body doesn t dispose of the trapped matter efficiently enough.This plaque interferes with surrounding neurons and causes them to malfunction or die.More research is needed before any concrete conclusions can be drawn, but the experimental evidence suggests that vaccines might be a powerful weapon in the war against Alzheimers.

A universal cancer vaccine is potentially within reach after scientists successfully demonstrated how our own bodies can be taught to kill cancer cells.The new therapy involves injecting tiny particles of engineered genetic code into the body which then effectively teach our own immune system how to recognise specific cancer cells.The team have so far only tested the therapy on mice and a few select human subjects.Tests on the mice found a strong immune system response against even the most aggressive cancers while the tests on humans were simply designed to prove that the therapy could be tolerated by the body with minimal side effects.It s a method which actually uses your body s own defenses to defeat the disease, which in turn then means it s less intrusive than other conventional treatments like chemotherapy.What this therapy effectively does is hack into the immune system and simply reprogramme the T-cells, so instead of fighting something like flu it starts attacking cancer cells instead.

Reuters — A group of 25 scientists on Thursday proposed an ambitious project to create a synthetic human genome, or genetic blueprint, in an endeavor that is bound to raise concerns over the extent to which human life can or should be engineered.A synthetic human genome potentially could make it possible to create humans who lack biological parents – raising the specter, for instance, of made-to-order human beings with special genetic enhancements.The scientists said that was not their aim.They said potential applications from a synthetic human genome include: growing transplantable human organs; engineering immunity to viruses; engineering cancer resistance; and accelerating vaccine and drug development using human cells and organs.The project aims to build such a synthetic genome and test it in cells in the laboratory within 10 years.The project, which arose from an invitation-only meeting of scientists last month at Harvard University that some critics denounced as too secretive, was unveiled in the journal Science by the experts involved.They acknowledged that their undertaking is controversial and said they would seek public involvement and the consideration of ethical, legal and social implications.The scientists, most of whom work at U.S. academic and other institutions, proposed what they called the Human Genome Project–Write.They said they hoped to get $100 million in public and private funding to launch it this year and expect total costs of less than the $3 billion used for the original Human Genome Project that completely mapped human DNA for the first time in 2003.A synthetic genome would involve using chemicals to create the DNA present in human chromosomes.The new project will include whole-genome engineering of human cell lines and other organisms of agricultural and public health significance, or those needed to interpret human biological functions, the scientists, led by geneticist Jef Boeke of the New York University Langone Medical Center, wrote in the journal Science.They said genome synthesis is a logical extension of the genetic engineering tools that have been used safely by the biotech industry for about four decades.The group also includes experts from Harvard Medical School, the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology, the U.S. government s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Yale University, the University of Edinburgh, Columbia University, the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Washington, Autodesk Bio/Nano Research Group, Bioeconomy Capital and other institutions.Scientists not involved in the project cited potential benefits from the work, including learning the function of vast parts of the genome that remain mysterious and helping better understand how genes are regulated and why there is so much genetic variation among individuals and human populations.The project is not as controversial as some observers might be saying, added University College London professor of synthetic biology John Ward.There is no call to make an entire human being.Critics worry about the unknown effects on new generations and the temptation by future parents to genetically engineer embryos to enhance characteristics such as intelligence or athletic ability.

It turns out that humanity is already thinking along those lines, and it s looking to introduce a type of universal cancer vaccine that would be able to trigger the human s body built-in defenses to kill cancerous cells.Specifically, researchers at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, have initiated a limited safety human trial, after experiments on mice showed impressive results.This allows it to travel anywhere in the body, including spleen, lymph nodes, and bone marrow.Tests conducted on mice showed that their immune systems were able to combat cancer aggressively.The point of the test was to see whether the vaccine is safe for humans, and the results are promising.A larger trial can only start in the following years.

Taking fingerprints from very young children – even newborns – is part of a drive in developing countries to monitor the health of infants, who often lack other forms of identification.A biometric system, such as a national fingerprint database, could allow clinicians to match a child with their vaccine schedule or help workers keep records of welfare services, says Jain.The team developed a machine-learning algorithm to enhance the scans.For infants fingerprinted at a month or younger, the system was accurate less than half the time.India s Aadhaar database already holds biometric data for hundreds of millions of citizens aged 5 and over.Savvides suggests that iris scans would be another way to do many of the things Jain s team has in mind.

Earlier today, the companies announced a phase I study with 40 healthy subjects to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and efficacy of the drug.As of May 2016, 58 countries and territories reported continuing mosquito-borne transmission of the Zika virus; the incidences of viral infection and medical conditions caused by the virus are expanding, not contracting.The company plans to start clinical trials in a few weeks and expects to report the results later this year.It certainly appears that things are moving quickly—and they most certainly are as far as these things go—but it could still take years before GLS-5700 can be used in the field.It s pretty remarkable that clinical testing for a disease that only attained emergency status a few months ago has already been slated for clinical testing.But as we now know, Zika can cause severe birth defects, including microcephaly.

The US Centers for Disease Control CDC and Prevention has granted clinical trial approval for an experimental Zika vaccine.Earlier today, the companies announced a phase I study with 40 healthy subjects to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and efficacy of the drug.As of May 2016, 58 countries and territories reported continuing mosquito-borne transmission of the Zika virus; the incidences of viral infection and medical conditions caused by the virus are expanding, not contracting.The company plans to start clinical trials in a few weeks and expects to report the results later this year.It certainly appears that things are moving quickly — and they most certainly are as far as these things g o— but it could still take years before GLS-5700 can be used in the field.It s pretty remarkable that clinical testing for a disease that only attained emergency status a few months ago has already been slated for clinical testing.

A pair of companies have gotten the go-ahead for human trials of a zika virus vaccination, they have announced.Inovio Pharmaceuticals and GeneOne Life Science got approval for a phase I trial, which will concern Inovio s Zika DNA vaccine GLS-5700.According to Inovio, this phase 1 trial will involve 40 healthy adult volunteers, and will look at the GLS-5700 s safety, tolerability and immunogenicity after being administered intradermally.The administration of the vaccine is done using a proprietary DNA delivery device belonging to Inovio called Cellectra.As of May 2016, 58 countries and territories reported continuing mosquito-borne transmission of the Zika virus; the incidences of viral infection and medical conditions caused by the virus are expanding, not contracting.We plan to dose our first subjects in the next weeks and expect to report phase I interim results later this year.

The trial will start in the next weeks, the companies said, and could yield results later this year.If the DNA-based vaccine is found to be safe, it will then move on to larger trials on efficacy that will take years to complete.In this case, the genetic material is from the Zika virus and codes for proteins that usually sit on the outside of the viral particle.Zika generally only causes mild illness in healthy adults, but it is known to cause birth defects.Many companies have been working on DNA-based vaccines for years, trying to get them to work for a range of diseases.We had projected that we would start our Phase 1 trial in September; it now looks like we may be able to start in mid-August, he wrote.

The first Zika virus vaccine has been approved for human clinical trials in the United States.The vaccine, which is being produced by South Korean pharmaceutical company GeneOne Life Science, could be distributed to patients as soon as July.Shutterstock / Nyvlt-artInovio President and CEO Dr. Joseph Kim, said in a statement: We were the first to construct the vaccine.The speed of the approval is testimony to the concern in the United States that Zika is spreading through out urban populations.The target population will be pregnant women and women of a child-bearing age, and clinical trials will be initially be tested on 40 healthy adults.The World Health Organisation advises reducing the risk of sexual transmission, people living in areas of local transmission should practice safe sex or abstain from sexual activity.

An educational support group attacked for anti-vaccination views is also a fierce opponent of WiFi in schools.The group WiseOnes delivers programs for gifted students in 30 Victorian high schools, but it seems that state's Department of Education vetting didn't pick up its unscientific views about vaccination or WiFi.Fairfax outlet The Age writes that the group posted and then removed an anti-vaccination article, which Wayback caught here.Its anti-vax stance is that gifted children's extra brain connections give them sensitivities that allow them to learn so fast and the downside is allergic reactions .Its anti-WiFi post points to a lot of scientific info in one place , at www.australianbiophysics.org, a site registered to WiseOnes' Pat Slattery.As The Age notes, The case raises serious questions about the lack of vetting in schools concerning third parties who are contracted to deliver educational programs .

Barrera and his team of about 10 scientists and technicians have been working full-time on Zika for the past six months.So why is this Army research lab working on Zika when 15 other academic or government labs are doing the same thing?Zika isn t fatal, and the military is made up of generally young, healthy individuals.With 13 percent of Zika-infected pregnant women giving birth to children with congenital problems, you are going to see hundreds if not thousands of kids that need lifelong care, Thomas says.Rapidly Deploying VaccinesThe scientist whose name adorns the big sign on the building, Walter Reed, was an army doctor who in the 1890s figured out that mosquitoes were spreading yellow fever to workers digging the Panama Canal and civilians living in marshy Washington, DC.As the US military footprint around the world grows, so too does the exposure of soldiers to infectious emerging diseases.

Superstar golfer Rory McIlroy has decided not to unleash his club and balls on the Rio Olympics this summer, due to fears over the Zika virus.The four-time major champion was due to represent Ireland at the games, so Team GB haven t lost a potential medal winner."Even though the risk of infection from the Zika virus is considered low, it is a risk nonetheless and a risk I am unwilling to take," said McIlroy, adding that health comes first.I will continue to endeavour to make my fans and fans of golf proud with my play on the course and my actions off it."The worry for potential parents is that not all Zika infections result in symptoms being displayed in adults.McIlroy s announcement comes shortly after the first potential vaccine for the Zika virus received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration.

Superstar golfer Rory McIlroy has decided not to unleash his club and balls on the Rio Olympics this summer, due to fears over the Zika virus.The four-time major champion was due to represent Ireland at the games, so Team GB haven t lost a potential medal winner."Even though the risk of infection from the Zika virus is considered low, it is a risk nonetheless and a risk I am unwilling to take," said McIlroy, adding that health comes first.I will continue to endeavour to make my fans and fans of golf proud with my play on the course and my actions off it."The worry for potential parents is that not all Zika infections result in symptoms being displayed in adults.McIlroy s announcement comes shortly after the first potential vaccine for the Zika virus received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration.

Mosquitoes of the genus Aedes can bring a number of infections on to people, including Zika, dengue and yellow fever. The mice received either a so-called DNA vaccine or an inactivated version of zikaviruset. - To our surprise gave both vaccine types complete protection against the virus variant that is currently circulating in South America after just a syringe, said Dan Barouch at Harvard Medical School in the US. In the same issue of Nature presents other researchers results showing that rhesus monkeys are susceptible to zikaviruset, something that could make these monkeys suitable as experimental animals before any vaccine is tested on humans. Zikaviruset belong - like the viruses that cause dengue and yellow fever - flavivirus family. Fear of zikaviruset has contributed to a sharp increase in women who want an abortion in South and Central America.