News

The resurgence of bed bugs over the last decade has caused problems in major U.S. cities where they infest homes, apartments, hotels, shelters and even places of work. The small, blood-feeding insects are not known to transmit diseases, but they can cause severe reactions in people who are allergic to them. Bed bugs usually go unnoticed until their numbers increase significantly, and getting rid of them can be costly.

In a global economy with expansive travel networks, it is possible now for nations to quickly exchange pathogenic bacteria and viruses. These are bugs without borders, and they are becoming a public health threat that requires vigilance in surveillance, control, prevention and antimicrobial stewardship.

The African Partnerships for Patient Safety (APPS) program, a World Health Organization (WHO) program, has paired 14 African hospitals each with a hospital in England, France or Switzerland.

Infection Control Today invited members of industry within the electronic surveillance system category to share their perspective on product evaluation and purchasing.

The Institute of Medicine estimates that tens of thousands of Americans die needlessly every year from avoidable medical errors, including infections acquired during surgery. GE and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs have now teamed up to change that. They will develop an intelligent system using robots, computer vision and automatic identification technologies like RFID tags to fetch, sort, and sterilize surgical tools. The system could save lives, and money.