Inequities in kidney health and kidney care.

Health inequity refers to the existence of unnecessary and unfair differences in the ability of an individual or community to achieve optimal health and access appropriate care. Kidney diseases, including acute kidney injury and chronic kidney disease, are the epitome of health inequity. Kidney disease risk and outcomes are strongly associated with inequities that occur across the entire clinical course of disease.

VectorNet: collaborative mapping of arthropod disease vectors in Europe and surrounding areas since 2010.

BackgroundArthropod vectors such as ticks, mosquitoes, sandflies and biting midges are of public and veterinary health significance because of the pathogens they can transmit. Understanding their distributions is a key means of assessing risk. VectorNet maps their distribution in the EU and surrounding areas.

[West Nile virus unexpectedly in the Netherlands].

West Nile virus (WNV) was first detected in birds, mosquitoes and subsequently in humans in the Netherlands in 2020. In 2016 , we had discussed the factors that influence the introduction, establishment and dissemination of WNV in the Netherlands and considered the probability that each of these three phases could occur in the Netherlands, and cause West Nile fever in humans, still relatively small. In the current article we evaluate on the basis of our reasoning at the time, whether we have missed important factors and/or whether new factors have appeared on the horizon.

The European Green Deal and nephrology: a call for action by the European Kidney Health Alliance.

The world faces a dramatic man-made ecologic disaster and healthcare is a crucial part of this problem. Compared with other therapeutic areas, nephrology care, and especially dialysis, creates an excessive burden via water consumption, greenhouse gas emission and waste production. In this advocacy article from the European Kidney Health Alliance we describe the mutual impact of climate change on kidney health and kidney care on ecology.

VectorNet: Putting Vectors on the Map.

Public and animal health authorities face many challenges in surveillance and control of vector-borne diseases. Those challenges are principally due to the multitude of interactions between vertebrate hosts, pathogens, and vectors in continuously changing environments. VectorNet, a joint project of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) facilitates risk assessments of VBD threats through the collection, mapping and sharing of distribution data for ticks, mosquitoes, sand flies, and biting midges that are vectors of pathogens of importance to animal and/or human health in Europe.

Exploring Vector-Borne Disease Surveillance and Response Systems in Beijing, China: A Qualitative Study from the Health System Perspective.

Background: Climate change may contribute to higher incidence and wider geographic spread of vector borne diseases (VBDs). Effective monitoring and surveillance of VBDs is of paramount importance for the prevention of and timely response to outbreaks. Although international regulations exist to support this, barriers and operational challenges within countries hamper efficient monitoring.

Making Vector-Borne Disease Surveillance Work: New Opportunities From the SDG Perspectives.

Surveillance of vector-borne diseases (VBDs) exemplifies a One Health approach, which entails coordinated, collaborative, multidisciplinary, and cross-sectoral approaches to address potential or existing health risks originating at the animal-human-ecosystem interface. However, at the intervention stage of the surveillance system, it is sometimes difficult or even impossible to act. The human dimension of VBD control makes them wicked problems requiring an interdisciplinary systems approach beyond the One Health domain.

Chikungunya virus outbreak in Sint Maarten: Long-term arthralgia after a 15-month period.

Background & Objectives: The first chikungunya (CHIK) epidemic in the Americas was reported in December 2013. Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) causes an acute febrile illness and is transmitted to humans by Aedes mosquitoes. Although earlier studies have described long-term clinical manifestations of CHIK patients infected with the East/Central/South African (ECSA) genotype, little is known about persistent manifestations in the Caribbean region, for which the Asian genotype is responsible.

Environmental surveillance during an outbreak of tularaemia in hares, the Netherlands, 2015.

Tularaemia, a disease caused by the bacterium Francisella tularensis, is a re-emerging zoonosis in the Netherlands. After sporadic human and hare cases occurred in the period 2011 to 2014, a cluster of F. tularensis-infected hares was recognised in a region in the north of the Netherlands from February to May 2015.

An analysis of community perceptions of mosquito-borne disease control and prevention in Sint Eustatius, Caribbean Netherlands.

Background: In the Caribbean, mosquito-borne diseases are a public health threat. In Sint Eustatius, dengue, Chikungunya and Zika are now endemic. To control and prevent mosquito-borne diseases, the Sint Eustatius Public Health Department relies on the community to assist with the control of Aedes aegypti mosquito.

[Birds, mosquitoes and West Nile virus: little risk of West Nile fever in the Netherlands].

Due to increased incidence of West Nile fever (WNF) in Europe and the rapid spread of West Nile virus (WNV) in the US, it is commonly thought that it will only be a matter of time before WNV reaches the Netherlands. However, assessing whether WNV is really a threat to the Dutch population is challenging, due to the numerous factors affecting transmission of the virus. Some of these factors are known to limit the risk of WNF in the Netherlands.

Copulation Activity, Sperm Production and Conidia Transfer in Aedes aegypti Males Contaminated by Metarhizium anisopliae: A Biological Control Prospect.

Background: Dengue is the most prevalent arboviral disease transmitted by Aedes aegypti worldwide, whose chemical control is difficult, expensive, and of inconsistent efficacy. Releases of Metarhizium anisopliae--exposed Ae. aegypti males to disseminate conidia among female mosquitoes by mating represents a promising biological control approach against this important vector.

Louse-borne relapsing fever (Borrelia recurrentis) in asylum seekers from Eritrea, the Netherlands, July 2015.

Two patients from Eritrea, recently arrived in the Netherlands, presented with fever and were investigated for malaria. Bloodfilms showed spirochetes but no blood parasites. Louse-borne relapsing fever caused by Borrelia recurrentis was diagnosed.

[Dengue and chikungunya acquired during travel in the tropics].

The global incidence of dengue and chikungunya has greatly increased over recent decades, partly due to the increase of geographic distribution of both vectors. These infections are endemic to the tropics and subtropics, however autochthonous transmission and outbreaks have been described in non-endemic areas. Currently, there is a large chikungunya outbreak in the western hemisphere which started in the Caribbean.

[Fighting mosquitoes in the Netherlands: risks and control of exotic mosquitoes].

Mosquitoes play a significant role globally in the transmission of so-called vector-borne diseases. In the Netherlands, native mosquitoes are capable of transmitting infectious disease. This has not resulted in outbreaks of disease over the last 50 years.

Vector-borne disease intelligence: strategies to deal with disease burden and threats.

Owing to the complex nature of vector-borne diseases (VBDs), whereby monitoring of human case patients does not suffice, public health authorities experience challenges in surveillance and control of VBDs. Knowledge on the presence and distribution of vectors and the pathogens that they transmit is vital to the risk assessment process to permit effective early warning, surveillance, and control of VBDs. Upon accepting this reality, public health authorities face an ever-increasing range of possible surveillance targets and an associated prioritization process.

Risk assessment of vector-borne diseases for public health governance.

Objectives: In the context of public health, risk governance (or risk analysis) is a framework for the assessment and subsequent management and/or control of the danger posed by an identified disease threat. Generic frameworks in which to carry out risk assessment have been developed by various agencies. These include monitoring, data collection, statistical analysis and dissemination.

[Japanese encephalitis in Southern Europe].

In 2012, a fragment of the Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) genome was isolated from a pool of Culex pipiens mosquitoes caught in 2010 and 2011 in Northern Italy. JEV has a broad geographical distribution in South and Southeast Asia and Oceania, and is the most important cause of viral encephalitis in Asia in humans and also causes encephalitis in horses and fertility problems in pigs. However, recently isolated JEV genome fragments in mosquitoes in Italy could be an indication of repeated introduction of JEV, enzootic circulation of JEV or a related virus in Southern Europe.

Climate change and public health policy: translating the science.

Public health authorities are required to prepare for future threats and need predictions of the likely impact of climate change on public health risks. They may get overwhelmed by the volume of heterogeneous information in scientific articles and risk relying purely on the public opinion articles which focus mainly on global warming trends, and leave out many other relevant factors. In the current paper, we discuss various scientific approaches investigating climate change and its possible impact on public health and discuss their different roles and functions in unraveling the complexity of the subject.

No evidence for the persistence of Schmallenberg virus in overwintering mosquitoes.

In 2011, Schmallenberg virus (SBV), a novel member of the Simbu serogroup, genus Orthobunyavirus, was identified as the causative agent of a disease in ruminants in Europe. Based on the current knowledge on arthropods involved in the transmission of Simbu group viruses, a role of both midges and mosquitoes in the SBV transmission cycle cannot be excluded beforehand. The persistence of SBV in mosquitoes overwintering at SBV-affected farms in the Netherlands was investigated.

Parasites of vectors--Ixodiphagus hookeri and its Wolbachia symbionts in ticks in The Netherlands.

Background: Ixodiphagus hookeri is a parasitic wasp of ixodid ticks around the world. It has been studied as a potential bio-control agent for several tick species. We suspected that the presence of Wolbachia infected I.