Probiotics found to assist in restoring normal immune function...

COVID-19 disrupts normal bowel flora

SARS-CoV-2 infection induces an aggressive inflammatory response which is strongly implicated in the cause of multi-organ dysfunction...

How can you be sure the bacteria and parasites are dead?

In the United States, 62% of the population has tried sushi at least once. (1) However, recent studies from Norway and Brazil indicate that consumers should be checking that their sushi and sashimi were recently prepared and stored properly. To define our terms, many...

Do food labels tell the full story of what consumers are eating? In the U.S., many citizens may be unaware of how much inulin they may be consuming on a daily basis.

As a result, individuals who consume inulin may suffer from digestive discomfort without knowing the true cause.(1) On many food labels, there is helpful and descriptive...

Melioidosis (also called Whitmore’s Disease) is an infectious and potentially fatal bacterial disease affecting approximately 165,000 individuals worldwide.(1) Symptoms of this disease range from mild fever, chest pain, and cough to more severe symptoms such as ulcers, chronic respiratory illness, and even central nervous system infection.(2, 3) Thankfully, person-to-person spread is extremely rare.(4) Y...

In the United States, Campylobacter is the most common bacterial cause of diarrhea, affecting 1.5 million U.S. residents every year.(1) Approximately 30% of Campylobacter strains have decreased susceptibility to fluoroquinolones (e.g., ciprofloxacin) or macrolides (e.g., azithromycin), the antibiotics commonly used to treat infections, which poses a serious threat to public health.(2)
In August...

More deadly than Lyme Disease...

In 1958, a five-year-old boy from Powassan, Ontario, Canada presented to a children’s hospital complaining of dizziness; his parents also described tremors of his left arm. Electroencephalogram readings showed a widespread disturbance in the patient’s brain. The patient’s condition began to ra...

The discovery of a cause, as well as treatment, for Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) may involve our commensal gut bacteria.

Millions of adults suffering from RA experience chronic pain, chronic inflammation, and often severe functional disability of the joints. Onset in older populations is a well-known risk factor, and RA...

Is a New and Better Vaccine Coming Soon?

A new player in the field of COVID vaccines could be arriving soon. The trials so far are encouraging for both safety and efficacy. It even has some advantages over the Pfizer, Moderna, and J&J vaccines that have become so familiar to us.

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Want to lower your risk of contracting a MAP-related malady? Here's how.

Emerging research is implicating Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis (MAP) as the etiological cause of various diseases including inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, Type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, m...

Is there a correlation between the end of mask mandates and the rise in cases of the common cold and influenza?

The start of the summer is aligning with another new beginning, one in which many around the world make a return to the “New Normal” and relearn what life was like before COVID-19. While some take baby ste...

Antidepressants may be our best bet in treating Ebola

The 2013 to 2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa made global headlines and inflamed discussion as the largest single outbreak of this deadly virus. The lack of a vaccine approved for use in humans and the rapid rate of mutation in the Ebolavirus genus create...

Can H. pylori colonization offer some protection against disease?

Helicobacter pylori is an organism typically known as the culprit of painful stomach ulcers and severe abdominal pain, although there is now growing evidence which suggesting...

Although of great concern, vaccination will help

When will the pandemic end? How many more COVID-19 waves will the U.S. go through? Will we go back to “normal” in the fall? All these questions depend largely on one factor: the epidemiology of the variants.

As the virus spreads around the world, variant strains hav...

How far do we have to go to reach herd immunity?

First of all we must know that herd immunity is defined as a form of indirect protection from infectious disease that can occur with some diseases when a sufficient...