RFP Indian Journal of Hospital Infection

Johne’s disease (JD) is one of the important diseases of ruminants, which is capable of causing major economic losses to farmers in terms of decline in productivity. JD is very difficult to treat if once entered in livestock farms. It is a chronic granulomatous enteric infection of ruminants caused by Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP). This organism was first reported by Johne and Frothingham in 1985. This infection is most often seen among domestic ruminants (cattle, sheep, goats, buffaloes and camels) as well as in wild ruminants. The disease has been reported in non-ruminants (pigs, horses, fox, lab animals) also.

Recognition of TP53’s prominent role in protection from cancer has boosted a huge amount of scientific reports (around 40000) describing the function of TP53 as a tumour suppressor. Quite an unusual feature of a tumour suppressor was noted – TP53 is point mutated rather than inactivated in cancers and is highly expressed in tumours. Mutation of TP53 gene confers novel oncogenic properties on TP53 protein.

Health care-associated infections are infections that occur while receiving health care, developed in a hospital or other health care facility that first appear 48 hours or more after hospital admission, or within 30 days after having received health care. Multiple studies indicate that during hospital stay patients get exposed to several hospitals associated infections such as pneumonias and catheter associated urinary tract infections .Simple infection control procedures, good sterilization techniques, use of combination antibiotics can prevent or minimize hospital associated infections. Recently Covid 19 pandemic caused a havoc in hospitals and became the most common infection that was spread among health care staff as well as patients leading to many hospitals suspending their surgical procedures and maternity care.

Fungi are eukaryotic, non-photosynthetic organisms. Most of the fungal organisms are saprophytic or commensals but some are parasitic as well, causing a myriad of diseases in animals and humans. Some of the fungal organisms are of zoonotic significance and hence can be transmitted from animals to humans. Fungal infections are chronic in nature and only few antifungals are available till date. Risk of fungal infection increases if the indivisual is immunocompromised, suffering from metabolic diseases, old aged and is undergoing prolonged antibiotic therapy. Antifungals are drugs aimed to treat fungal infections. These target the fungal cell, cell membrane, metabolism, nucleic acid, growth and divisions. But as fungi are eukaryotic organisms, antifungals aimed to kill the fungal organism can also potentially harm the host cell.

Candida auris has developed as a multidrug-resistant (MDR) fungal pathogen connected to medical care around the world. Due to its outbreak potential, antibiotic resistance, and high mortality, Candida auris infection has arisen as a significant problem in the care of patients admitted to ICUs in India. Candidemia caused by C. auris has been recorded from three continents since the initial report of earcanal infection by this yeast in Japan in 2009, with a substantial number of cases from India. Some C. auris strains have higher minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) than amphotericin B and echinocandin compounds, while some C. auris strains are resistant to all antifungal medication classes. According to a comparison of European Committee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (EUCAST) and Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) techniques, C. auris isolates exhibit strikingly comparable fluconazole resistance but a broad range of MICs for the other antifungal drug classes. The goal of this research is to learn more about curcumin's antifungal properties. This polyphenolic chemical has been used for medical, culinary, and other uses throughout Asia for centuries. Although curcumin has been shown to have antifungal properties, a current study reveals that curcumin works by disrupting the fungal cell wall.

COVID 19 is caused by the SARS CoV2 virus and is raging across the length and breadth of all the countries of the world at present. A plethora of clinical manifestations are evident in this infection in man, but animals or wildlife and the environment also play a pivotal role in transmission of the infection and persistence and evolution of the virus. A three pronged One Health approach is hence very important for optimum epidemiological surveillance and management of COVID 19. In this article the authors have tried to explain and address these pertinent issues.

The current pandemic caused by COVID-19 is raging across the world now. The causative agent is SARS-CoV2. Till now more than 5 lakh deaths have been reported in India, alone because of this pandemic. The diagnosis of COVID-19 rests upon detecting the pathogen or its antigen in nasopharyngeal swabs by PCR and rapid diagnosis by various lateral flow techniques of rapid ICT tests. So far ICT tests from blood samples have not been tried. We are here to present our research to find out the evaluation of ICT tests from blood samples.