faulker092

The Centers for Disease Control reported late last year that Cryptococcus gattii fungal infections were diagnosed in Alabama (1), California (13), Florida (1), Georgia (5), Hawaii (1), Michigan (1), Montana (1), and New Mexico (2) since 2009.  This is surprising because the fungus only first emerged in North America in British Columbia in 2009.  Shortly after, it spread to the Pacific Northwest, and it has now reached the North American East Coast. C. gattii infections are contracted by inhalation of fungal spores after encountering areas of decaying forest matter or areas near pigeon droppings, which support the growth of the fungus 2 .  The resulting cryptococcosis infection can lead to pulmonary irritation/infection and potential pneumonia or, more seriously, central nervous system infection 1 .  Animals present symptoms similar to humans, and the wide array of species that have been affected includes cats, dogs, birds, ferrets, llamas, alpacas, goats, sheep, hors...

Armando E. Gonzalez, PhD, is the head of the Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics Laboratory at the San Marcos School of Veterinary Medicine in Peru.  He obtained a Master degree in microbiology from San Marcos and his PhD in veterinary epidemiology and economics at the University of Reading.  He holds an Associate Appointment at the Bloomberg School of Public Health (Johns Hopkins University), and is currently the president of the Peruvian Academy of Veterinary Sciences.  Dr. Gonzalez devotes his time to the study of the control and transmission of cysticerosis, and the tapeworm Taenia solium .  Specifically, his research examines the transmission of zoonotic cestodes and the role that invertebrates play in T. solium egg dispersion.  His talk at the North Carolina One Health Intellectual Exchange centered on the epidemiology of T. solium, as well as, intervention and control techniques used in multidisciplinary approaches to parasitic diseases.  Dr. Gon...

The One Health Discussion series continued this year with Peter Rabinowitz, MD, MPH who is an Associate Professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Science and the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington, where he directs the Human Animal Medicine Project. http://deohs.washington.edu/hamp/   He completed a Family Medicine residency at UC San Francisco and a fellowship in General Preventive Medicine/Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the Yale School of Medicine.  The Human Animal Medicine Project explores the linkages between human, animal, and environmental health including zoonotic infectious disease at the human-animal interface, animals as ‘sentinels’ of environmental health hazards, and clinical collaboration between human health care providers and veterinarians in a species-spanning approach. A goal of the Project is to serve as an incubator and organizer of research, training, and clinical activities at the University ...