WCMC News

March 2009--Drug Blocks Two of World's Deadliest Emerging Virsues
Existing, Low-Cost Anti-Malaria Treatment Found Effective in Laboratory Test Tube Experiments

NEW YORK (March 5, 2009) -- Two highly lethal viruses that have emerged in recent outbreaks are susceptible to chloroquine, an established drug used to prevent and treat malaria, according to a new basic science study by researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College in the Journal of Virology. Due to the study's significance, it was published yesterday, online, in advance of the first April print issue.
 
The two henipaviruses that are the subject of the study -- Hendra Virus (HeV) and Nipah Virus (NiV) -- emerged during the 1990s in Australia and Southeast Asia. Harbored by fruit bats, they cause potentially fatal encephalitis and respiratory disease in humans, with a devastating 75 percent fatality rate. More recently, NiV outbreaks in Bangladesh involving human-to-human transmission have focused attention on NiV as a global health concern.
 
The researchers, based in Weill Cornell's pediatrics department, were surprised by their discovery that chloroquine, a safe, low-cost agent that has been used to combat malaria for more than 50 years, is a highly active inhibitor of infection by Hendra and Nipah.

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Februray 2009--Clinical Infectious Diseases: High Mortality Among Patients With AIDS Who Received a Diagnosis of Tuberculosis in the First Three Months of Antiretroviral Therapy

Serena P. Koenig, Cynthia Riviere, Paul Leger, Patrice Joseph, Patrice Severe, Kea Parker, Sean Collins, Erin Lee, Jean W. Pape, and Daniel W. Fitzgerald

We analyzed mortality among 201 patients with AIDS and tuberculosis in Haiti. Patients who received a diagnosis of tuberculosis during the first 3 months after the initiation of antiretroviral therapy were 3.25 times more likely to die than were other patients with AIDS and tuberculosis. Failure to recognize active tuberculosis at initiation of antiretroviral therapy leads to increased mortality.

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February 2009---The Warren D. Johnson, Jr. Medical Center Inaugurated In Haiti

On February 10, Dr. Warren D. Johnson, Jr., former Chief of Infectious Diseases, and now Director of the Center for Global Health within the Department of Medicine's Infectious Diseases Division, was honored during an inauguration ceremony, in which a new clinical facility was named after him in Port au Prince, Haiti: The Warren D. Johnson, Jr. Medical Center. This clinical facility is one of two new buildings on the new campus of GHESKIO, which is a French acronym for the Haitian Group for the Study of Kaposi's sarcoma and Infectious Diseases. Founded in 1982, GHESKIO is the first institution in the world exclusively dedicated to the fight against HIV/AIDS. The construction of the new clinical facility was sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development and will double the space available at GHESKIO for research, training and clinical services. A second laboratory building was also inaugurated at the ceremony and was named in honor of Rodolphe Merieux, the late son of the President of the French Biotechnology company, BioMerieux, Lyon, Alain Merieux.

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December 2008--Bulletin of the World Health Organization

Survival, plasma HIV-1 RNA concentrations and drug resistance in HIV-1-infected Haitian adolescents and young adults on antiretrovirals

Macarthur Charles, Francine Noel, Paul Leger, Patrice Severe, Cynthia Riviere, Carole Anne Beauharnais, Erica Miller, John Rutledge, Heejung Bang, Wesley Shealey, Richard T D'Aquila, Roy M Gulick, Warren D Johnson, Peter F Wright, Jean William Pape & Daniel W Fitzgerald

 AIDS is the leading cause of death in adolescents and youth aged 13–25 years in sub-Saharan Africa and Caribbean countries that have generalized epidemics of infection with HIV-1.1–3 Antiretroviral therapy (ART) can dramatically decrease AIDS mortality.4–6 However, about 50% of HIV-1-infected adolescents on ART in the United States of America (USA) have detectable plasma HIV-1 ribonucleic acid (RNA) after 12 months of treatment,7,8 a virologic failure rate significantly higher than the 20% rate reported for adults in both high-income and resource-poor settings.9–12 Such a low rate of success in adolescents in the USA is associated with poor adherence to treatment. There are limited data on outcomes after ART in HIV-1-infected adolescents and youth in developing countries, and no country has published data on HIV-1 drug resistance. The authors report survival, plasma HIV-1 RNA concentrations and HIV-1 drug resistance patterns in 146 adolescents and youth aged 13–25 years who were infected with HIV-1 and fulfilled the clinical criteria for AIDS and were consecutively treated with ART in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, beginning in March 2003.

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November 2008--Newly Discovered Protein May Help Explain Tuberculosis' Resiliency 
Experts Find Another Reason Why the Bacterium Is So Nasty

Weill Cornell scientists have located a protein produced by the tuberculosis bacterium that may tell researchers more about how the invader lives so resiliently inside of the body. Dr. Benjamin Gold, working with Dr. Carl Nathan, chairman of microbiology and immunology at Weill Cornell Medical College and their colleagues, located a protein called mycobacterial metallothionein (MymT), which acts like a shield to protect the tuberculosis bacterium from the body's natural defenses.

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October 2008---Weill Cornell Medical College Receives Two $100,000 Grand Challenges Explorations Grants for Innovative Global Health Research by Drs. Anne Moscona and Carl Nathan

NEW YORK (Oct. 30, 2008) -- Weill Cornell Medical College announced today that it has received two $100,000 Grand Challenges Explorations grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The grants will support innovative global health research projects: "Untimely Triggering of the Fusion Mechanism Used by Viruses for Entry: A New Antiviral Approach Using Engineered Microparticles," conducted by Dr. Anne Moscona, and "Senescent and Rejuvenated Mtb Subsets on Exit from Latency," conducted by Dr. Carl Nathan.
   
The projects are two of 104 grants announced by the Gates Foundation for the first funding round of Grand Challenges Explorations, an initiative to help scientists around the world explore bold, new solutions for health challenges in developing countries. The grants were provided to all levels of scientists in 22 countries and five continents.

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Contact InfoAndrew Kleinank2017@med.cornell.edu

October 2008--Weill Cornell's Dr. Nathaniel Hupert Named Inaugural Director of CDC's New Preparedness Modeling Unit
He Will Lead Computer-Modeling Efforts to Prepare for Public Health Emergencies

NEW YORK (Oct. 29, 2008) A leading authority in using computer models to predict and plan for public health emergencies, Dr. Nathaniel Hupert has been named director of the new Preparedness Modeling Unit at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). He remains associate professor of public health and medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College and associate attending physician at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell in New York City.
     
In his new role, Dr. Hupert will support preparedness modeling activities both within the CDC and among its federal, state, local, and academic partners with the aim of helping formulate policies to safeguard the public's health before, during and after emergency situations, such as infectious disease outbreaks, natural disasters, environmental exposures, climate change and bioterrorism.   
     
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Office of Public Affairs
Weill Cornell Medical College
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