SciDev.Net

This United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) portal publishes news, statistics and guidance related to the A(H1N1) influenza virus, more commonly known as 'swine flu'. The CDC presents facts and figures on the virus, as well as information and advice for specific groups of people, including pregnant women, travellers, clinicians, laboratory workers and people with HIV/AIDS.

It publishes daily press briefings and situation updates as well as weekly morbidity and mortality reports. The website also hosts an image gallery, with pictures of the virus, and a range of social media, including online videos, podcasts and widgets.

The website has useful information about resistance, particularly about antibiotic use in animals. It has educational material for parents on how to deal with children’s infections, including which infections need antibiotics and which don’t. It also looks at the overuse of antibacterial cleaning products (for example, hand soaps) and acne medication, which may not be used in the poorest developing countries but are likely to be used in richer ones.

The website has links to several key United States initiatives to better understand how antibiotics resistance develops, educational projects for healthcare workers and consumers, and guidelines on when to use antibiotics.

The CDC's website on climate change and public health offers the background on why the spread of infectious disease is likely to change in the future. A special section on vector-borne diseases outlines how global warming could lead to the re-emergence of diseases such as dengue fever that have nearly been eradicated in some countries. It links to both the CDC's own program on these diseases as well as further reading material.

The site is aimed at lay readers, including travellers to malaria-affected countries, physicians and health workers. It contains extensive background information on malaria disease, diagnosis, treatment, prevention and control. It also covers a brief outline of the history of the discovery of malaria.

The EPA regulates the US government's environmental activities and enforces related legislation. As this website shows, it also undertakes research on the links between human health and the environment. Here the agency summarises some of the key research on climate change and health, including vector-borne disease. Although much of the agency's research does focus on the United States, its studies on how global warming will impact air quality and pollution, for example, are likely to be useful around the world.