Eight people have been sickened by Legionnaires’ disease at a rehabilitation center near Pittsburgh.

The Allegheny County Health Department tells the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ( http://bit.ly/poJVc2) that nobody has died at the LGAR Health & Rehabilitation Center in Turtle Creek, where staff are taking precautions to keep the bacteria-driven illness from spreading.

The bacteria causes pneumonia-like symptoms and can result in a high fever, too.

Health Department director Dr. Bruce Dixon says the bacteria sometimes spreads when facilities install systems from prevent hot water from scalding people, which causes the water to become tepid and conducive to the bacteria…Read more

inding love on the Internet can be an arduous process. Though many Internet dating sites claim to have their own unique algorithms for aiding you in the search, the truth is that choosing a mate among thousands of online profiles often comes down to little more than a gut feeling.

Now there’s a new social network that has succumbed to that concept completely — in the most literal way possible. Called MyMicrobes, the site connects people based entirely upon similarities in their gut bacteria, reports Nature…Read more

CHENNAI: Do you drink water from the dispensers at Chennai airport? You will not, if you know what is in it. Tests conducted by King Institute, which functions under the Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, have found that water supplied through dispensers at the airport contains high levels of coliform bacteria that can cause diarrhea and vomiting. What is ironic is that water in a treatment plant sump was found more contaminated than untreated water.

The city airport, frequented by more than 15,000 passengers a day, has more than 100 drinking water dispensers in the domestic and international terminals and other operational areas, and holds about five lakh litres of water. Groundwater and water supplied by Metrowater are used after being treated at a reverse osmosis plant maintained by the Airports Authority of India…Read more

After getting a cut, many Americans will reach for a tube of over-the-counter antibiotic cream to ward off infection. But that widespread habit, a new paper suggests, may be contributing to the rise of one of the most concerning strains of drug-resistant bacteria.

Japanese researchers looked at 261 samples of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), including two samples of the USA300 strain, a type of MRSA that has gained attention for its spread, its frequent presence in the community as well as the hospital, and its link to necrotizing fasciitis, also known as flesh-eating disease…Read more

The warming of the world’s oceans can cause serious illness and may cost millions of euros (dollars) in health care.

That is the alarm sounded in a paper released online Tuesday on the eve of a two-day conference in Brussels. The 200-page paper is a synthesis of the findings of more than 100 projects funded by the European Union since 1998. It was produced by Project CLAMER, a collaboration of 17 European marine institutes.

The paper says the rising temperature of ocean water is causing a proliferation of the Vibrio genus of bacteria, which can cause food poisoning, serious gastroenteritis, septicemia and cholera…Read more

The water supply at Livingstone hospital in Port Elizabeth contains traces of E coli bacteria, which could be harmful for those with weak immune systems, according to a report on Wednesday.

The bacteria could cause diarrhoea, urinary tract infections and pneumonia in the sick, elderly and young children, according to the report on the Herald Online.

The findings were part of tests commissioned by the newspaper for tap water in Korsten, Motherwell, Summerstrand, Framesby and Livingstone Hospital.

Tests conducted by Pathcare Laboratories revealed that many water samples taken around Port Elizabeth contained no “free chlorine”, which is needed to kill off germs and bacteria…Read more

With implications that could eventually benefit sites forever changed by nuclear contamination, researchers at Michigan State University have unravelled the mystery of how microbes generate electricity while cleaning up nuclear waste and other toxic metals.

Details of the process, which can be improved and patented, are published in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“Geobacter bacteria are tiny micro-organisms that can play a major role in cleaning up polluted sites around the world,” said Gemma Reguera, who is an MSU AgBioResearch scientist. “Uranium contamination can be produced at any step in the production of nuclear fuel, and this process safely prevents its mobility and the hazard for exposure.”…Read more

New Delhi: Drinking full cream poly-packed milk even that of well known brands without boiling can be harmful because of excessive bacteria, according to a report by the city-based NGO Consumer Voice…Read more

Even today, the legacy of the Cold War leaches into the waters of Colorado. Uranium, freed from the earth and destined for nuclear weapons, now contaminates the groundwater beneath several Colorado mines. But at some of these mines, a most unusual clean-up crew is at work. Lashing about with long electric cables connected to their own bodies, they remove dissolved uranium from the water. Each one of these janitors is just a thousandth of a millimetre across. They’re called Geobacter. They’re bacteria. The handful of Geobacter species are recent discoveries. The first one, G.metallireducens, was discovered in the Potomac River in 1987. Another, G.sulfurreducens, was later found in oil-soaked Oklahoman soils. The group has the remarkable and useful ability to break down a range of contaminating chemicals, such as petroleum compounds…Read more

Experiments on mice showed the injections could completely eliminate tuberculosis bacteria in some cases, Nature Medicine reports.

The only TB vaccine – the BCG jab – is not very effective.

The research is in its early stages and the potential for a human vaccine is unknown, campaign group TB Alert says.

Tuberculosis is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It is one of the top 10 leading causes of death, according to the World Health Organization, killing 1.7 million people each year…Read more