Mar 21, 2025 04:06 PM
(This post was last modified: Mar 21, 2025 04:54 PM by C C.)
Nearly half of depression diagnoses could be considered treatment-resistant (ineffective pharmaceutics)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1077639
INTRO: Almost half of patients diagnosed with depression classify as being ‘treatment-resistant’ as new research suggests that many don’t respond to multiple antidepressant options.
The new study, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry was led by academics from the University of Birmingham and Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust. The study found that 48% of patients whose electronic healthcare records reported a diagnosis of depression had tried at least two antidepressants, and 37% had tried four or more different options.
Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) is typically defined as a form of depression that isn’t effectively managed after a patient tries two different antidepressants. There are currently few guidelines for treating TRD... (MORE - details, no ads)
Potential risk biomarkers found for schizophrenia resulting from cannabis use (drugs & mental illness)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1077693
INTRO: Cannabis is one of the most widely used substances in the world, with some 228 million users between the ages of 15 and 64. The risk of developing schizophrenia increases significantly with cannabis use, especially when it starts at a young age. What is more, it is estimated that approximately 10% of cannabis users will develop cannabis use disorder during their lifetime. Curiously, almost a third of individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia also meet the criteria for cannabis use disorder; and cannabis use disorder affects up to 42% of people with schizophrenia.
In this bid to shed light on the biological mechanisms that determine why some individuals develop schizophrenia while others only experience cannabis use disorder, despite similar levels of exposure to cannabis, the UPV/EHU’s Neuropsychopharmacology group has managed to detect “potential biomarkers in the blood that could help predict the risk some people have of developing a psychiatric disorder such as schizophrenia if they use cannabis”, explained Leyre Urigüen, coordinator of the study published recently in Scientific Reports..... (MORE - details, no ads)
We’ve entered a forever war with bird flu (VAXX defense)
https://www.theverge.com/science/632605/...h-bird-flu
INTRO: Avian influenza is “evolving in ways we haven’t seen before,” says Martha Nelson, a computational biologist and staff scientist researching pathogen evolution at the National Institutes of Health — one of many scientists who have been monitoring the global H5N1 outbreak. Bird flu “is adapting to mammals, and it continues to show new tricks,” Nelson tells The Verge. The virus is spreading widely in domestic and wild animals, while exact transmission routes remain unclear. Confirmed human cases are rising, particularly among farmworkers.
More than two years into the US outbreak, we’re stuck with H5N1 for the long haul. The risk that it mutates to spread readily from person to person and that we could find ourselves in the middle of another pandemic is entrenched. As the Trump administration hacks away at scientific institutions and rapid federal changes impede the flow of information, the threat looms especially large. To mitigate those chances, animal agriculture, wildlife management, trade policy, and even cat owners may have to adapt to manage the virus on multiple fronts — indefinitely.
It’s like “watching a train wreck in slow motion.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), along with many virologists and epidemiologists outside the agency, continue to describe the threat that the virus poses to the public as low. Yet the likelihood of an H5N1 human pandemic “is growing,” says Nelson.
The vast majority of the 70 confirmed human cases in the US have been mild. But since last November, at least four people have been hospitalized with H5N1 in North America (three in the US and one in Canada). In January, one person died in Louisiana after contracting the virus from a backyard poultry flock.
Until recently, Nelson and other bird flu experts held out hope that, with some basic interventions, the H5N1 outbreak among cows and poultry would burn itself out and that cases among wild animals might fade away, as they did during a brief 2014-2015 outbreak. But the latest events prove that isn’t likely. “It’s hard to imagine a scenario where it’s no longer a pandemic threat,” Nelson says.
Since the virus was first detected in cows in March 2024, almost 1,000 dairy herds have been infected. Despite that spread, scientists saw a silver lining: for nearly the whole year, all of those cases were infections of a viral genotype called B3.13, believed to have entered the cattle population from a single spillover event in Texas, wherein a cow caught the virus from a wild bird. “We thought this was a one-off: one bird to one cow, and we wouldn’t see that again,” says Peter Halfmann, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Influenza Research Institute.
Yet the more severe human cases are concurrent with the spread of a recently mutated, potentially more dangerous version of the virus called the D1.1 genotype. D1.1. is now circulating among wild birds and poultry, and it has spilled over into dairy cows at least twice in 2025, according milk testing data from the Agriculture Department. With D1.1, Halfmann explains that the threshold for cross-species transfer is “much lower than we previously thought.”
“There is absolutely no chance of containment, and we now have to think about mitigation and monitoring.”
Bird flu infections have also been confirmed among rats and mice near farms. Many other wild mammals, including fox, deer, and skunks are testing positive for the virus, but rodents are a particular concern given their notorious propensity to infest human dwellings and act as vectors of disease, says Meghan Davis, an epidemiologist and veterinarian at Johns Hopkins University. “When you have one of these classic reservoir hosts with highly pathogenic avian influenza, it gives you pause,” she says. “If this host could set up to be a reservoir, what implications would that have for our control strategies?” (MORE - details)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1077639
INTRO: Almost half of patients diagnosed with depression classify as being ‘treatment-resistant’ as new research suggests that many don’t respond to multiple antidepressant options.
The new study, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry was led by academics from the University of Birmingham and Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust. The study found that 48% of patients whose electronic healthcare records reported a diagnosis of depression had tried at least two antidepressants, and 37% had tried four or more different options.
Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) is typically defined as a form of depression that isn’t effectively managed after a patient tries two different antidepressants. There are currently few guidelines for treating TRD... (MORE - details, no ads)
Potential risk biomarkers found for schizophrenia resulting from cannabis use (drugs & mental illness)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1077693
INTRO: Cannabis is one of the most widely used substances in the world, with some 228 million users between the ages of 15 and 64. The risk of developing schizophrenia increases significantly with cannabis use, especially when it starts at a young age. What is more, it is estimated that approximately 10% of cannabis users will develop cannabis use disorder during their lifetime. Curiously, almost a third of individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia also meet the criteria for cannabis use disorder; and cannabis use disorder affects up to 42% of people with schizophrenia.
In this bid to shed light on the biological mechanisms that determine why some individuals develop schizophrenia while others only experience cannabis use disorder, despite similar levels of exposure to cannabis, the UPV/EHU’s Neuropsychopharmacology group has managed to detect “potential biomarkers in the blood that could help predict the risk some people have of developing a psychiatric disorder such as schizophrenia if they use cannabis”, explained Leyre Urigüen, coordinator of the study published recently in Scientific Reports..... (MORE - details, no ads)
We’ve entered a forever war with bird flu (VAXX defense)
https://www.theverge.com/science/632605/...h-bird-flu
INTRO: Avian influenza is “evolving in ways we haven’t seen before,” says Martha Nelson, a computational biologist and staff scientist researching pathogen evolution at the National Institutes of Health — one of many scientists who have been monitoring the global H5N1 outbreak. Bird flu “is adapting to mammals, and it continues to show new tricks,” Nelson tells The Verge. The virus is spreading widely in domestic and wild animals, while exact transmission routes remain unclear. Confirmed human cases are rising, particularly among farmworkers.
More than two years into the US outbreak, we’re stuck with H5N1 for the long haul. The risk that it mutates to spread readily from person to person and that we could find ourselves in the middle of another pandemic is entrenched. As the Trump administration hacks away at scientific institutions and rapid federal changes impede the flow of information, the threat looms especially large. To mitigate those chances, animal agriculture, wildlife management, trade policy, and even cat owners may have to adapt to manage the virus on multiple fronts — indefinitely.
It’s like “watching a train wreck in slow motion.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), along with many virologists and epidemiologists outside the agency, continue to describe the threat that the virus poses to the public as low. Yet the likelihood of an H5N1 human pandemic “is growing,” says Nelson.
The vast majority of the 70 confirmed human cases in the US have been mild. But since last November, at least four people have been hospitalized with H5N1 in North America (three in the US and one in Canada). In January, one person died in Louisiana after contracting the virus from a backyard poultry flock.
Until recently, Nelson and other bird flu experts held out hope that, with some basic interventions, the H5N1 outbreak among cows and poultry would burn itself out and that cases among wild animals might fade away, as they did during a brief 2014-2015 outbreak. But the latest events prove that isn’t likely. “It’s hard to imagine a scenario where it’s no longer a pandemic threat,” Nelson says.
Since the virus was first detected in cows in March 2024, almost 1,000 dairy herds have been infected. Despite that spread, scientists saw a silver lining: for nearly the whole year, all of those cases were infections of a viral genotype called B3.13, believed to have entered the cattle population from a single spillover event in Texas, wherein a cow caught the virus from a wild bird. “We thought this was a one-off: one bird to one cow, and we wouldn’t see that again,” says Peter Halfmann, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Influenza Research Institute.
Yet the more severe human cases are concurrent with the spread of a recently mutated, potentially more dangerous version of the virus called the D1.1 genotype. D1.1. is now circulating among wild birds and poultry, and it has spilled over into dairy cows at least twice in 2025, according milk testing data from the Agriculture Department. With D1.1, Halfmann explains that the threshold for cross-species transfer is “much lower than we previously thought.”
“There is absolutely no chance of containment, and we now have to think about mitigation and monitoring.”
Bird flu infections have also been confirmed among rats and mice near farms. Many other wild mammals, including fox, deer, and skunks are testing positive for the virus, but rodents are a particular concern given their notorious propensity to infest human dwellings and act as vectors of disease, says Meghan Davis, an epidemiologist and veterinarian at Johns Hopkins University. “When you have one of these classic reservoir hosts with highly pathogenic avian influenza, it gives you pause,” she says. “If this host could set up to be a reservoir, what implications would that have for our control strategies?” (MORE - details)