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Mvuyo Makhasi, National Institute for Communicable Diseases; Cheryl Cohen, National Institute for Communicable Diseases, and Sibongile Walaza, University of the Witwatersrand Respiratory diseases are highly infectious and cause a significant health burden. Disease surveillance is the bedrock of public health responses to outbreaks or epidemics caused by these diseases. Effective surveillance gives an indication of …

Tracking symptoms of respiratory diseases online can give a picture of community health Read More »

After South African scientists sounded the alarm about the new omicron variant, countries around the world closed their borders. Kim Ludbrook/EPA Gemma Ware, The Conversation and Daniel Merino, The Conversation What is it like to discover a new coronavirus variant? In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we hear the inside story from one …

South African scientists on the inside story of discovering omicron – and what their experience offers the world about future variants. Podcast Read More »

What would happen if all the mosquitoes in the world disappeared?  Curious Kids is a series for children in which we ask experts to answer questions from kids. “Most people in the world absolutely hate mosquitoes. Personally, I don’t mind them – they don’t really bite me, so they do not bother me that much. …

What would happen if all the mosquitoes in the world disappeared? Read More »

In South Africa, the burden of communicable diseases greatly threatens the health sector, as recently demonstrated by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic that placed tremendous pressure on healthcare workers and the sector alike. For this reason, non-pharmaceutical interventions have been, and continue to be our best defence against communicable diseases. Adopting certain behaviour, for instance, healthy hand …

The importance of non-pharmaceutical interventions Read More »