In his speech today at the Informal Meeting of EU Ministers responsible for health, ECDC Director Marc Sprenger highlighted these challenges and encouraged countries to maintain investment in public health and to work toward smarter and better cooperation.
Today, the impact of vaccines on Public Health is at the centre of the discussions in the conference organised by the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) in Prague. This conference brought together experts to debate the many-sided correlations between vaccines, medicine and society at the dawn of the third millennium.
A four-fold increased incidence of narcolepsy in vaccinated children/adolescents compared to unvaccinated children was observed in this register-based cohort study.
From 1 April 2011, nearly six years after it became operational, ECDC changes its organisational structure. The reorganisation aims at a greater flexibility towards newly arising priorities and further strengthening the disease-specific work at ECDC.
ECDC has been honoured to receive the 2011 Anders Gustâv Minnesfond Award. The award of SEK 50 000 kr was received by ECDC Director Marc Sprenger in a ceremony at ECDC’s premises in Solna on 30 March.
2 papers are reviewed: A Novel Risk Factor for a Novel Virus: Obesity and 2009 Pandemic Influenza A (H1N1) and Morbid Obesity as a Risk Factor for Hospitalization and Death Due to 2009 Pandemic Influenza A(H1N1) Disease.
ECDC Director Marc Sprenger and WHO/Europe Regional Director Zsuzsanna Jakab have signed an Administrative Agreement between ECDC and WHO/Europe during the 8th Senior Officials Meeting of the European Commission (EC) and World Health Organisation (WHO), held in Brussels on 24-25 March 2011.
IGRAs are increasingly being considered for the diagnosis of LTBI, as a replacement to the TST, including travel medicine. As with the TST, many uncertainties remain with regard to the efficacy of the IGRAs. It is therefore essential to secure an accurate understanding of these assays‘ known efficacy, so that they be optimally used and only in context with proven effect.