RIO DE JANEIRO: Heavy rains over the past month have created a fertile breeding ground for mosquitoes carrying the dengue fever virus, deepening a crisis that has claimed at least 80 lives in the state of Rio. The dengue strain ravaging this tropical city is believed to be stronger and more deadly than the virus responsible for an epidemic in 2002, considered the worst in recent history in Brazil, according to Dr. Jacob Kligerman, health secretary for the city.

>> Governments of Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast have announced a joint health programme to tackle a meningitis epidemic, which has gripped the bordering area of the two countries. By the second week

Researchers have developed the first animal model of the infection caused by chikungunya virus (CHIKV), an emerging arbovirus associated with large-scale epidemics that hit the Indian Ocean, seriously affecting the French Island of La Reunion in 2005, before spreading to India, and Italy in 2007. Using a mouse model, scientists of the Pasteur Institute and INSERM in France determined which tissues and cells are infected by the virus in both the mild and severe forms of the disease. They document their findings in an article published in the latest issue of the US online open-access journal PLoS Pathogens. With the model, the researchers show how after an initial phase of viral replication in the liver, the infection extends to the joints, muscles and skin

The government of Uganda has confirmed the outbreak of the deadly meningitis bacterium in the country. On January 16, health officials said that 121 people are suffering from the disease in Arua and

Twenty-one African countries, often referred as the meningitis belt, will be hit by the worst epidemic of the disease by the end of this year's rainy season, said who at an emergency meeting of un

The Democratic Republic of Congo has been put on