Predicting the Next Outbreak

  • The program is supposed to identify new viruses in animals before they spread to humans. (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)

A new coalition wants to set up an
early warning system for diseases
that pass between animals and humans.
Samara Freemark reports
some research institutions and conservation
groups are launching the PREDICT program:

Transcript

A new coalition wants to set up an
early warning system for diseases
that pass between animals and humans.
Samara Freemark reports
some research institutions and conservation
groups are launching the PREDICT program:

Organizers hope the program will help prevent the spread of diseases like avian flu, ebola, and swine flu. PREDICT researchers will work in disease ‘hotspots’ overseas.

Program director Stephen Morse is an epidemiologist at Columbia University in New York. He says the program will identify new viruses in animals before they spread to humans.

“We don’t even know how may emerging viruses, let alone other infectious organisms there are out there in nature, but the number must be large.”

The PREDICT program will also create better global disease warning systems.

“This is really essential to our survival as well as something very important to understand if we want to be able to control infections in the future.”

Morse hopes the program will help governments stop local outbreaks before they become global pandemics.

For The Environment Report, I’m Samara Freemark.

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Illegal Drugs in Wastewater

  • A one day snapshot of wastewater from 96 cities and towns in Oregon shows that meth was found in many samples - not just larger urban areas (Photo courtesy of the journal Addiction)

A new report tracks illegal drug use by looking at wastewater. Rebecca Williams has more:

Transcript

A new report tracks illegal drug use by looking at wastewater. Rebecca Williams has more:

A lot of studies have found prescription drugs people take end up in wastewater, and now researchers are also tracking illegal drugs that way.

Caleb Banta-Green is the lead author of the report in the journal Addiction.

He studied a one day snapshot of wastewater from 96 cities and towns in Oregon.

He says cocaine and ecstasy were much more likely to be used in larger urban areas. But they found meth everywhere, even after a crackdown to make it harder to get the ingredients to make it.

“That sort of appetite or interest for methamphetamine has been built up in those rural areas and it looks like that use is continuing and it’s also being found in urban areas.”

He says it’s not clear if trace amounts of these drugs might eventually end up in drinking water. But previous studies indicate other kinds of legal drugs can be detected in sources of drinking water.

For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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