Humidifier Disinfectants Are a Cause of Lung Injury among Adults in South Korea: A Community-Based Case-Control Study.

Backgrounds: An outbreak of lung injury among South Korean adults was examined in a hospital-based case-control study, and the suspected cause was exposure to humidifier disinfectant (HD). However, a case-control study with community-dwelling controls was needed to validate the previous study's findings, and to confirm the exposure-response relationship between HD and lung injury.

Methods: Each case of lung injury was matched with four community-dwelling controls, according to age (±3 years), sex, residence, and history of childbirth since 2006 (for women).

Diarrheal outbreak caused by atypical enteropathogenic Escherichia coli O157:H45 in South Korea.

Unlabelled: Background: In May 2013, an outbreak of gastroenteritis occurred in a high school in Incheon, South Korea. We investigated the outbreak in order to identify the pathogen and mode of transmission.

Materials And Methods: A case-control study was performed using standardized questionnaires with a case definition of illness with diarrhea.

A cluster of lung injury cases associated with home humidifier use: an epidemiological investigation.

Background: In April 2011 a tertiary hospital in Seoul, Korea reported several cases of severe respiratory distress of unknown origin in young adults.

Methods: To find the route of transmission, causative agent and patient risk factors of the outbreak, an investigation of the epidemic was initiated. Clinicopathological conferences led to the suspicion that the cases related to an inhalation injury.

Socioeconomic burden of influenza in the Republic of Korea, 2007-2010.

Background: Although the socioeconomic burden of 2009 pandemic influenza A (H1N1) was considerable, no reliable estimates have been reported. Our aim was to compared medical costs and socioeconomic burden resulting from pandemic influenza A (H1N1) 2009 with that of previous seasonal influenza.

Methods: We estimated the medical costs and socioeconomic burden of influenza from May 2007 to April 2010.

Humidifier disinfectant-associated children's interstitial lung disease.

Rationale: Beginning in 2006, epidemics of a fatal lung injury of unknown cause in children were observed in Korea every spring. A recent study demonstrated that this type of children's interstitial lung disease (chILD) is associated with humidifier disinfectant use.

Objectives: To determine the clinical characteristics of this type of chILD and to assess whether the nationwide suspension of humidifier disinfectant sales in the autumn of 2011 affected its incidence.

Inhalation toxicity of humidifier disinfectants as a risk factor of children's interstitial lung disease in Korea: a case-control study.

Background: The occurrence of numerous cases of interstitial lung disease in children (chILD) every spring in Korea starting in 2006 raised suspicion about a causal relationship with the use of humidifier disinfectants (HDs). The aim of this study was to evaluate the association between HD use and the risk of chILD.

Methods: This retrospective, 1∶3 matched case-control study consisted of 16 cases of chILD that had developed between 2010 and 2011.

In-Flight Transmission of Novel Influenza A (H1N1).

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed two patients, who had taken the same plane from Los Angeles to Seoul, with novel influenza A (H1N1). Through contact tracing, we concluded that the second patient was infected during the flight.

[National level response to pandemic (H1N1) 2009].

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced the emergence of a novel influenza on April 24, 2009, and they declared pandemic on June 11. In Korea, the proportion of influenza-like illness and the consumption of antiviral agents peaked in early November. The government established the Central Headquarters for Influenza Control and operated the emergency response system.