A year after the 2009 human H1N1 pandemic began, researchers detected the H1N1 virus in free-ranging northern elephant seals off the central California coast. It is the first report of that flu strain in any marine mammal.

H1N1 originated in pigs. It emerged in humans in 2009, spreading worldwide as a pandemic. The World Health Organization now considers the H1N1 strain from 2009 to be under control, taking on the behavior of a seasonal virus.

A map of avian influenza (H7N9) risk is now available. The map is comprised of bird migration patterns, and adding in estimations of poultry production and consumption, which are used to infer future risk and to advise on ways to prevent infection.

As of today, there have been 127 confirmed cases of H7N9 in mainland China with 27 deaths. A lack of information about the virus and its mode of transmission has led to public concerns that H7N9 could be a pandemic waiting to happen.

Genital warts prevalence in Australian women plummeted 59% since a nationally funded quadrivalent human papillomarivus (HPV) vaccination program
 for teen and pre-teen girls was introduced in 2007, says a paper in BMJ.

Type 2 diabetes has a strong hereditary component, and while we can't change the genes we were born with, if epigenetics says a father eating a Twinkie before conception can lead to bad grades for the child in high school, why can't we modify the function of the genes through the epigenetic changes that take place in the course of life?

Transgenic goats' milk modified to produce higher levels of the human antimicrobial protein lysozyme is effective in treating diarrhea in young pigs, proof-of-concept that food products from transgenic animals could also benefit human health.

The researchers say this is the first study showing that goats’ milk carrying elevated levels of lysozyme, a protein found in human breast milk, can successfully treat diarrhea caused by bacterial infection in the gastrointestinal tract. Human diarrheal diseases claim the lives of 1.8 million children around the world and impair the physical and mental development of millions more and these findings offer hope that genetically fortified milk could eventually help prevent such diseases.

The widespread introduction of a chicken pox vaccine in Australia in 2006 has prevented thousands of children from being hospitalized with severe chicken pox and saved lives, according to a national study of chicken pox admissions at four participating Australian children's hospitals.

Chicken pox is a highly contagious infection spread by airborne transmission or from direct contact with the fluid from skin lesions caused by the disease. In its most serious form, chicken pox can cause severe and multiple complications, including neurological conditions, and even death.

A University of Granada researcher has a new hypothesis concerning why bacteria seem to becoming increasingly more resistant to antibiotics.

Bacteria are incredibly versatile - they have been found in some of the most extreme conditions on the planet, and it may be just evolution in action. In this instance,  Mohammed Bakkali, a scientist in the Genetics Department at the Faculty of Science of the UGR,
 believes that bacteria that are non-resistant to antibiotics acquire resistance 'accidentally' because they take up the DNA of others that are resistant, due to the stress to which they are subjected. 

The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is more accurately known as herpesvirus 4 (HHV-4), one of 8 viruses in the herpes family and one of the most common viruses in humans, affecting more than 90 percent of the population worldwide and over 95% of adults in America - so common it is almost hard to attribute it to anything. 

The Epstein-Barr viruswas first discovered in the early 1960s. Infections in early childhood usually have no symptoms, but it remains for life and also people infected during adolescence or young adulthood may develop mononucleosis. It has been associated with Hodgkin's lymphoma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and nasopharyngeal carcinoma.