Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Ability to Trace Cholera in Haiti

New science has provided the opportunity to see where the strain causing the Cholera outbreak originated. Originally having been thought to come from Latin America, these new tests have shown that it traveled to Haiti from South Asia. It also showed that this epidemic did not spread from water currents rather it was transmitted by people. This article also continued to talk about a new DNA sequencing machine which could greatly decrease the cost and increase the pace of sequencing. This machine could possibly create a sort of "disease weather map" which would collect daily data to see how germs are spreading. This new innovation could prevent future epidemics!!


http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/sequencing-machine-aided-in-cholera-project/?scp=3&sq=Cholera&st=cse

1 comment:

james said...

a couple of 10 minute videos detailing the paralyzed and ineffectual relief effort, quite sobering

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpa8f3Q8eds&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf-rC3VZ