Scanning electron micrograph of Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria, which cause TB. (credit: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases )

For the second time, contaminated bone graft products from the medical company Aziyo Biologics Inc. are linked to a highly unusual and deadly outbreak of tuberculosis .

This week, three new tuberculosis cases were identified, bringing the outbreak total to five, according to Politico . One person has died. The contaminated material, used for surgical and dental procedures, was implanted in at least 36 other patients, who are now being treated as if they have tuberculosis.

Aziyo Biologics issued a recall of all of its bone matrix products earlier this month "out of an abundance of caution" after the first two cases were identified. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that all unused products from the affected lot have been sequestered so that they will not be used. The affected materials had been sent to health care facilities in California, Michigan, New York, Oregon, Texas, and Virginia.

Enlarge / The Plaza Mayor or Plaza de Armas of Lima in Peru, part of a Unesco world heritage site in Lima. (credit: Getty | Frédéric Soltan/Corbis )

Over 230 people in Peru have developed a rare, paralyzing neurological disorder called Guillain-Barré Syndrome, leading government officials to declare a national emergency and the World Health Organization to send out a disease outbreak alert.

So far, four people have died from the disorder, which involves the immune system attacking peripheral nerves. It often starts with progressive muscle weakness and numbness that can lead to paralysis and, in about a quarter of the cases, the need for mechanical ventilation.

Peru—a country of over 34 million people—typically sees fewer than 20 suspected cases per month of Guillain-Barré Syndrome (pronounced ghee-yan bar-ray or abbreviated GBS). But, between June 10 and July 15, the country tallied 130 cases, including the four deaths, bringing the year's total to 231, the WHO reported Tuesday.

Enlarge / The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters stands in Atlanta, Georgia, on Saturday, March 14, 2020. (credit: Getty | Bloomberg )

The tally of COVID-19 cases linked to a conference of disease detectives hosted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in April has reached at least 181, the agency reported .

Roughly 1,800 gathered in person for this year's annual Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) Conference, which was held on April 24 to 27 in a hotel conference facility in Atlanta where the CDC's headquarters are located. It was the first time the 70-year-old conference had in-person attendees since 2019. The CDC agency estimates an additional 400 attended virtually this year.

By the last day of the event, a number of in-person attendees had reported testing positive for COVID-19, causing conference organizers to warn attendees and make changes to reduce the chance of further spread. That reportedly included canceling an in-person training and offering to extend the hotel stays of sick attendees who needed to isolate.

Enlarge / This 2006 image depicts two sides of a Petri dish (reverse L, front R) growing a filamentous colony of Fusarium solani , the potential fungal pathogen behind the outbreak. (credit: CDC/ Mark Lindsley, Sc.D. D(ABMM), Lynette Benjamin, Shirley McClinton )

A second person in the US has died in an outbreak of fungal meningitis linked to surgeries in Mexico that involved epidural anesthesia. While the case count is now up to 18, more than 200 others across 25 states may have also been exposed, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned in an outbreak update Wednesday .

So far, the outbreak among US patients spans 224 people, with 206 potentially exposed and under investigation, nine suspected cases, and nine probable cases. Two of the patients with probable cases have died.

Last week, the CDC released a travel advisory and a health alert to clinicians about the cases. At the time, health authorities had identified only five cases, all Texas residents , one of whom had died. An update Wednesday from Texas health officials said that they have since identified two more cases, bringing the state's total to seven. All seven cases were hospitalized, but the officials are still reporting only one death in Texas.

Enlarge / An electron micrograph of a number of Marburg virions responsible for causing Marburg virus disease. (credit: Getty | BSIP )

Equatorial Guinea's first-ever outbreak of Marburg virus —a relative of Ebola virus that causes similarly deadly hemorrhagic fever—is continuing to grow, spreading over a wide geographic area with potentially undetected chains of transmission, officials for the World Health Organization said.

As of Wednesday morning, officials in Equatorial Guinea had reported nine confirmed cases, with seven confirmed deaths across three provinces since early February.

"However, these three provinces are 150 kilometers apart, suggesting wider transmission of the virus," WHO's Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a press conference Wednesday .

Enlarge (credit: Getty | UniversalImagesGroup )

Two more people have died and more details of horrifying eye infections are emerging in a nationwide outbreak linked to recalled eye drops from EzriCare and Delsam .

The death toll now stands at three, according to an outbreak update this week from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A total of 68 people in 16 states have been infected with a rare, extensively drug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa strain linked to the eye drops. In addition to the deaths, eight people have reported vision loss and four have had their eyeballs surgically removed (enucleation).

In a case report published this week in JAMA Ophthalmology, eye doctors at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, part of the University of Miami Health System, reported details of one case linked to the outbreak—a case in a 72-year-old man who has an ongoing infection in his right eye with vision loss, despite weeks of treatment with multiple antibiotics. When the man first sought treatment he reported pain in his right eye, which only had the ability to detect motion at the point, while his left eye had 20/20 vision. Doctors noted that the white of his right eye was entirely red and white blood cells had visibly pooled on his cornea and in the front inner chamber of his eye.

Enlarge / Security guards stand in front of the closed Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the city of Wuhan, in the Hubei Province, on January 11, 2020, where the Wuhan health commission said that the man who died from a respiratory illness had purchased goods. (credit: Getty | NOEL CELIS )

A group of independent, international researchers has released its full analysis of newly uncovered metagenomic data collected by the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in January and February of 2020. The data closely links SARS-CoV-2 to the genetic tracks of wild animals, particularly raccoon dogs , sold at the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market in Wuhan, China, the early epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic, the group's analysis says.

The full analysis provides additional, compelling evidence that the pandemic coronavirus made its leap to humans through a natural spillover, with a wild animal at the market acting as an intermediate host between the virus' natural reservoir in horseshoe bats and humans. It was authored by 19 scientists, led by Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona; Kristian Andersen, a virologist at the Scripps Research Institute in California; and Florence Débarre, a theoretician who specializes in evolutionary biology at France's national research agency, CNRS.

Prior to the release of the full analysis late Monday, information on the findings was only made public through media reports and statements from the World Health Organization, which was briefed on the analysis last week. But, the raw metagenomic data behind the analysis is still not publicly available. It was briefly posted on a public genetic database called the Global Initiative on Sharing Avian Influenza Data (GISAID) as recently as earlier this month, and the international researchers were able to download it during that window of availability. But, administrators for the database quickly removed the data after its discovery, saying the removal was at the request of the submitter, a researcher at China CDC.

Enlarge / Micrograph of Clostridium botulinum (credit: Getty | BSIP )

Health officials in Europe are warning of an outbreak of botulism linked to botched weight loss procedures carried out in Turkey that aimed to paralyze stomach muscles to reduce appetite. So far, authorities have identified 67 cases—53 in Turkey, 12 in Germany, and one each in Austria and Switzerland.

Botulism is a life-threatening neuroparalytic condition caused by the botulinum toxin, which is made by the bacterial species Clostridium botulinum . There a several forms of botulism , but in this outbreak, the cases are a form called iatrogenic botulism, which occurs when too much toxin is injected during medical procedures. Iatrogenic botulism is associated with generalized muscle weakness, drooping eyes, difficulty swallowing, and difficulty breathing. The cases in the outbreak have ranged from mild to severe, with a number of people ending up in intensive care, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) reported .

The botulinum toxin is one of the most poisonous natural substances known ; a dose of just 1 nanogram per kilogram weight is lethal . Nevertheless, it has been used for cosmetic purposes, such as smoothing facial wrinkles, and some therapeutic purposes , such as treating an overactive bladder and chronic migraine headaches .