📢 Prof Alan Bernstein steps down as Director of #OxfordGlobalHealth after 2.5 years
Prof @Susannajd & @atuire take the helm as Co Directors, leading the next chapter of interdisciplinary research & global partnerships to improve lives worldwide🌍
www.globalhealth.ox.ac.uk/news/leaders...
🫀How do we tackle global hypertension crisis?
A new by Tony Etyang.et.al, it starts in the community.
💡 CHWs achieving 96.8% agreement with clinicians on cardiovascular screening
💡 CHW-led care improving control by 21%
💡 Digital monitoring doubling control rates
📖 Read more 👉: shorturl.at/iBXNS
It would have been at the day 38 point on figure 2 in the TAPER trial, but difference is the TAPER trial had 2 weeks of extra duration in the intervention arm, in Fidax vs Vanc trial it was 10 days for both arms.
15% vs 25% over 4 weeks - not long but long enough to have seen the effect in the trial above. Would be nice to have longer follow up data, but I don't think we are going to get it.
Also tapered vanc only seems to be briefly better at that one timepoint and overall recurrence rates were the same, whereas fidaxomicin was lower recurrence rate overall compared to vanc.
Can't see results on that link, but I don't think it is safe reasoning to say A better than B in trial 1, B same to C in trial 2, therefore A better than C. Could be low power in trial 2, for instance, and network analyses needed to address this.
In head to head fidaxomycin vs vancomycin, fidaxomycin had lower recurrence rate - e.g. www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.... - but I suppose not clear if this is still true in a post-027 world.
Figure 2 makes it look like the extended vancomycin just delays the recurrence by a few weeks. Which doesn't seem all that helpful.
New preprint from us @modmedmicro.bsky.social where we validate the diagnostic accuracy of a metagenomic nanopore sequencing method for respiratory RNA viruses.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...
🧬Curious about the state of malaria drug resistance in Kenya?
Our study shows first-line malaria treatments remain effective but early resistance signals highlight need for routine molecular surveillance, monitoring emerging markers & data-informed treatment policy.
🔗Read here👉: shorturl.at/RnpYC
4/4 A key learning from this evaluation is that bioinformatic criteria are key, need to be set prospectively, and that both sensitivity and specificity depend on these decisions.
3/ 4Then there is barcode crossover because we can't afford to burn a whole flow cell on a single sample (cost entirely prohibitive if we do).
2/4 Reflecting honestly on this, metagenomics at scale is a tough proposition when evaluated like this. Targeted PCR is highly sensitive, sequencing is expensive and host DNA contamination makes it more so.
1/4 Thrilled to get this metagenomic diagnostic study over the line. We have an in house method that targets RNA viruses in respiratory samples, and evaluated this against 344 prospective samples tested by multiplex PCR.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...
Yes, I think fair enough to do these studies when limited data on how well it worked in different populations, but hard to say now that we have equipoise about LEN compared to an experimental vaccine.
The ethics seem difficult where LEN might be unavailable, but for similar costs as enrolling a patient and giving an experimental vaccine, one could provide LEN.
Any discussion on how difficult it might be to test preventive vaccines when lenacapavir is available - i.e. seems difficult to follow up a high risk cohort ethically without providing this?
The Engagement Department is holding a two-day climate change learning workshop to support development of a pilot public engagement programme. The workshop builds understanding of climate health nexus in Kenya, explores community impacts, and maps key stakeholders to inform collaboration & action.
Are you a post-doctoral microbiologist interested in characterising bacterial resistance evolution and want to apply your knowledge and expertise to developing new therapeutics for Klebsiella (and other Enterobacterales) infections? Then we need you! Apply now bit.ly/3MX39Ce close date March 13th 👀
Opinion piece on disease modelling - rdcu.be/e4cOv - written by Alice Kamau and Emelda Okiro (tinyurl.com/ydx3cz4f) - on that gaps between distant modelling groups and people directly measuring things from an LMIC perspective @kemriwellcome.bsky.social @ndm.ox.ac.uk @wellcometrust.bsky.social
Who qualifies for health subsidies and how do we ensure fairness?
📚Our study on Kenya’s UHC indigent programme shows that defining and identifying poverty is complex. Effective targeting requires equitable coverage needs strong data, local insight, transparency, and trust.
🔗: shorturl.at/GfB36
❗Pre-COVID-19 T-cell responses may help explain why SARS-CoV-2 infections caused lower morbidity and mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa compared to Europe, Asia, and North America
Supported by the #EDCTP2-funded ImmunoCoV project.
🔗 Full article: doi.org/10.1186/s128...
New research article
The effect of pneumococcal conjugate vaccine and pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine on nasopharyngeal colonisation following human infection challenge with serotype 3 and serotype 6B (PREVENTING PNEUMO 2)
www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...
#IDSky #ClinMicro #OpenAccess #OA
If you're interested, click on www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/g... - Life and Medical Sciences, Clinical Medicine 04!
A long time ago in a galaxy far away, there was a SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Our paper, led by @martibartfast.bsky.social
a) correcting errors in 4.5 million genomes & their phylogeny
b) improving representation of the Global South in public data
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
(thread 1/n)
MMM has an exciting UNIQ+ project running this summer -apply now!
Bacteria, microplastics & resistance — what’s the connection?
#Microplastics are everywhere, even in hospitals. But what happens when bacteria stick to them? Come and find out!
@afswinkels.bsky.social @nstoesser.bsky.social
Happy our preprint is out🦠:
"Evaluation of an Oxford Nanopore sequencing workflow for mycobacteria from primary MGIT culture"
We developed and tested a workflow for long-read sequencing of #mycobacteria, including optimising DNA extraction and assessing how #ONT performs compared with #Illumina.
First paper of my PhD @doerrlab.bsky.social is up! We characterized meropenem tolerance in Enterobacterales species, and then further dissected tolerance mechanisms in Klebsiella pneumoniae. journals.plos.org/plospathogen...
Just as the world needs global health the most, we are losing 20th century visionaries. Foege, Hinman, and now Nick White.
Sir Nick White transformed malaria treatment with data on artemisinin. Billions treated, millions saved
Mentor to many @MORUBangkok @OUCRU_Vietnam @nuffieldcollege.bsky.social
We are deeply saddened by the passing of Professor Sir Nicholas White @moru-mip.bsky.social
Nick was a visionary in #malaria treatment whose work transformed global health.
He will be remembered with great respect and affection
Read our tribute 👉 www.tropicalmedicine.ox.ac.uk/news/profess...
