The MRSA was transmitted among members of a wrestling team. Infection with MRSA should be suspected in outbreaks of boils that are nonresponsive to standard antibiotic therapy among healthy participants of contact sports and their close contacts.

Free-roaming dogs and rabies transmission are integrally linked across many low-income countries, and large unmanaged dog populations can be daunting to rabies control program planners. Dog population management (DPM) is a multifaceted concept that aims to improve the health and well-being of free-roaming dogs, reduce problems they may cause, and may also aim to reduce dog population size. In theory, DPM can facilitate more effective rabies control. Community engagement focused on promoting responsible dog ownership and better veterinary care could improve the health of individual animals and dog vaccination coverage, thus reducing rabies transmission. Humane DPM tools, such as sterilization, could theoretically reduce dog population turnover and size, allowing rabies vaccination coverage to be maintained more easily. However, it is important to understand local dog populations and community attitudes toward them in order to determine whether and how DPM might contribute to rabies control and which DPM tools would be most successful. In practice, there is very limited evidence of DPM tools achieving reductions in the size or turnover of dog populations in canine rabies-endemic areas. Different DPM tools are frequently used together and combined with rabies vaccinations, but full impact assessments of DPM programs are not usually available, and therefore, evaluation of tools is difficult. Surgical sterilization is the most frequently documented tool and has successfully reduced dog population size and turnover in a few low-income settings. However, DPM programs are mostly conducted in urban settings and are usually not government funded, raising concerns about their applicability in rural settings and sustainability over time. Technical demands, costs, and the time necessary to achieve population-level impacts are major barriers. Given their potential value, we urgently need more evidence of the effectiveness of DPM tools in the context of canine rabies control. Cheaper, less labor-intensive tools for dog sterilization will be extremely valuable in realizing the potential benefits of reduced population turnover and size. No one DPM tool will fit all situations, but if DPM objectives are achieved dog populations may be stabilized or even reduced, facilitating higher dog vaccination coverages that will benefit rabies elimination efforts.

OBJECTIVE -To evaluate the performance, in settings typical of opportunistic and community screening programs, of screening tests currently recommended by the American Diabetes Association (ADA) for detecting undiagnosed diabetes.RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS -Volunteers aged Ն20 years without previously diagnosed diabetes (n ϭ 1,471) completed a brief questionnaire and underwent recording of postprandial time and measurement of capillary blood glucose (CBG) with a portable sensor. Participants subsequently underwent a 75-g oral glucose tolerance test; fasting serum glucose (FSG) and 2-h postload serum glucose (2-h SG) concentrations were measured. The screening tests we studied included the ADA risk assessment questionnaire, the recommended CBG cut point of 140 mg/dl, and an alternative CBG cut point of 120 mg/dl. Each screening test was evaluated against several diagnostic criteria for diabetes (FSG Ն126 mg/dl, 2-h SG Ն200 mg/dl, or either) and dysglycemia (FSG Ն110 mg/dl, 2-h SG Ն140 mg/dl, or either).RESULTS -Among all participants, 10.7% had undiagnosed diabetes (FSG Ն126 or 2-h SG Ն200 mg/dl), 52.1% had a positive result on the questionnaire, 9.5% had CBG Ն140 mg/dl, and 18.4% had CBG Ն120 mg/dl. The questionnaire was 72-78% sensitive and 50 -51% specific for the three diabetes diagnostic criteria; CBG Ն140 mg/dl was 56 -65% sensitive and 95-96% specific, and CBG Ն120 mg/dl was 75-84% sensitive and 86 -90% specific. CBG Ն120 mg/dl was 44 -62% sensitive and 89 -90% specific for dysglycemia. CONCLUSIONS -Low specificity may limit the usefulness of the ADA questionnaire. Lowering the cut point for a casual CBG test (e.g., to 120 mg/dl) may improve sensitivity and still provide adequate specificity.

Objectives To describe therapeutic antibiotic use patterns in dogs at a small animal teaching hospital. Methods A retrospective case analysis of randomly sampled antibiotic prescriptions in dogs from May 20, 2008 – May 20, 2009, deemed to be for therapeutic use, was performed. Records were reviewed to determine if there was documentation of confirmed, suspected or no evidence of infection. The five most frequently prescribed antibiotics were identified and analyzed for their distribution in these categories. Results In 17% of therapeutic antibiotic prescriptions there was confirmed infection, in 45% suspected infection, and in 38% there was no documented evidence of infection. Amoxicillin-clavulanate was the most frequently prescribed antibiotic, followed by cefazolin/cephalexin, enrofloxacin, ampicillin/amoxicillin and doxycycline. Doxycycline was the most frequently prescribed with no documented evidence of infection, and amoxicillin-clavulanate was the most frequently prescribed with either confirmed or suspected evidence of infection. Discussion Clinicians use a variety of tools when deciding whether or not to prescribe an antibiotic and which antibiotic to use. As in human medicine, there is likely overuse and inappropriate use of antibiotics in veterinary medicine. Veterinarians should engage in discussions regarding clinically applicable guidelines for appropriate antibiotic use.

BACKGROUND. An investigation of the relationship between incident human cases of Lyme disease and seroprevalence of antibodies to B. burgdorferi in dogs was undertaken in order to determine whether dogs might serve as sentinels for Lyme disease. METHODS. 3011 canine serum samples were analyzed by ELISA for antibody to B. burgdorferi. Records of incident human cases of Lyme disease were obtained from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. RESULTS. Regression analyses of the relationship between the log10 (mean incidence in people 1985-1989) and canine seroprevalence from July 1988-August 1989 revealed that canine seroprevalence was highly predictive of incidence (R2 = 0.86, p less than .0001). A logistic regression model that incorporates the altitude of the town where each dog was resident, the date of sampling, and information on each dog's age, sex, and breed adequately explained the risk of canine seropositivity. Dogs resident at altitudes less than 200 feet, of sporting or large mixed breeds, and greater than two years of age were five times, four times, and almost three times more likely, respectively, to exhibit seropositivity than were other dogs. CONCLUSIONS. Estimates of the prevalence of antibody to B. burgdorferi in dog populations offers a sensitive, reliable, and convenient measure of the potential risk to people of B. burgdorferi in the environment. Risk factors for canine seropositivity may directly or indirectly illuminate certain aspects of the epidemiology of human Lyme disease.

Some conservationists believe that free‐ranging cats pose an enormous risk to biodiversity and public health and therefore should be eliminated from the landscape by any means necessary. They further claim that those who question the science or ethics behind their arguments are science deniers (merchants of doubt) seeking to mislead the public. As much as we share a commitment to conservation of biodiversity and wild nature, we believe these ideas are wrong and fuel an unwarranted moral panic over cats. Those who question the ecological or epidemiological status of cats are not science deniers, and it is a false analogy to compare them with corporate and right‐wing special interests that perpetrate disinformation campaigns over issues, such as smoking and climate change. There are good conservation and public‐health reasons and evidence to be skeptical that free‐ranging cats constitute a disaster for biodiversity and human health in all circumstances. Further, there are significant and largely unaddressed ethical and policy issues (e.g., the ethics and efficacy of lethal management) relative to how people ought to value and coexist with cats and native wildlife. Society is better served by a collaborative approach to produce better scientific and ethical knowledge about free‐ranging cats.

Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), indirect immunofluorescent-antibody assay (IFA), and Western immunoblot were used to test serum samples from 128 dogs for the presence of antibody to Borrelia burgdorferi. Sera included 72 samples from dogs suspected of having Lyme disease, 32 samples from dogs residing in areas in which Lyme disease was not considered endemic, and 24 samples from dogs with clinical and serologic evidence of immune-mediated disease (n = 10), Rocky Mountain spotted fever (n = 5), or leptospirosis (n = 9). Results of Western immunoblotting were used as the standard against which performances of ELISA and IFA were measured. ELISA was significantly more sensitive than IFA (84.8 versus 66.7%), although both tests were equally specific (93.5%). Eight samples that were positive by Western immunoblot were simultaneously negative by ELISA and IFA. Of these eight, four were from dogs suspected of having immune-mediated disease, two were from dogs suspected of having leptospirosis, and two were from dogs suspected of having Lyme disease. These results may indicate that sera from dogs with immune-mediated disease, and to a lesser extent sera from those with leptospirosis, cross-react with B. burgdorferi antigens. Alternatively, Western immunoblot results may not truly reflect Lyme disease status, particularly in the case of dogs with immune-mediated diseases. At present, however, the use of Western immunoblotting as a diagnostic standard for dogs offers the best alternative to a clinical definition of disease.

The major premise of One Health is engagement of multiple disciplines to address shared problems spanning human, animal, and ecosystem health. The current model of academic specialization encourages development of isolated disciplines within the university setting, thereby creating barriers to resource sharing and academic collaboration. The aim of this project was to develop a systematic approach to mapping university assets that could be harnessed to advance One Health education. Asset in this context was defined as a course, program, or faculty expertise relevant to a particular One Health problem. The approach adopted comprised the following steps: (1) identify a current problem that would benefit from an integrated, interdisciplinary perspective (e.g., EIDs [emerging infectious diseases]); (2) identify individual disciplinary teaching areas pertinent to the problem (e.g., health communication, wildlife ecology); (3) identify competencies expected to be attained by graduates who will address the problem (e.g., respond to outbreaks); (4) survey faculty members on their teaching areas and curricular offerings that address these competencies; and (5) compile responses in a database that is searchable by teaching area and competency. We discuss our recent experiences mapping the assets at Tufts University that are relevant to the problem of EIDs with emphasis on zoonotic-disease surveillance, outbreak investigation, and outbreak response. Using 13 teaching areas and 16 competencies relevant to applied epidemiology, we identified and characterized previously untapped resources across the university. Asset mapping is thus a useful tool for identifying university resources and opportunities that can be leveraged to support interdisciplinary education for One Health.