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A new therapeutic for stroke based on University of Georgia research will soon enter clinical trials. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared the new drug, known as AB126, to enter a Phase 1b/2a clinical trial, which is expected to begin in the first half of 2024 and will require significant funds to complete. This is the first stage of the trial and will test the safety and efficacy of the therapeutic in ischemic stroke patients.

When the coronavirus pandemic first began in 2020, there was much that officials did not know about the virus and how to combat it. One area of concern was how to disinfect surfaces that were contaminated with SARS-CoV-2. Institutions such as schools and daycares especially needed to know how to clean high-touch surfaces to reduce the risk of infection.

Kevin Vogel, an assistant professor in the Department of Entomology at the University of Georgia, has received a prestigious Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program award from the National Science Foundation. Supported by the more than $1 million CAREER grant, Vogel and his team will spend the next five years building upon the still-limited body of research regarding the symbiotic relationship between kissing bugs and a highly specified bacterium that resides in their gut.

At the same time they were building clinical capacity, the University of Georgia's CARE team was developing a curriculum to educate communities and health care providers about Alzheimer’s and dementia prevention and the need for diagnosis. To help get that curriculum in front of rural communities and providers, they turned to experts at UGA Cooperative Extension.

Vaccines are a proven benefit in the world of animal science. Producers have vaccinated livestock and pet owners have vaccinated dogs and cats for decades. Soon beekeepers may be able to protect their colonies through vaccination. The University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and Dalan Animal Health have teamed up to advance the world’s first honey bee vaccine.

A kiss has such romantic appeal, yet some kisses just end in heartbreak. A smooch from the Rhodnius prolixus, or the blood-sucking “kissing bug,” could be characterized more like the kiss of death — the insect is a primary vector for Chagas disease, a parasitic infection that kills more than 10,000 people annually around the globe. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, victims with chronic cases of Chagas can suffer from life-threatening heart or digestive malfunctions.

A gene that causes bacteria to be resistant to one of the world’s most important antibiotics, colistin, has been detected in sewer water in Georgia. The presence of the MCR-9 gene is a major concern for public health because it causes antimicrobial resistance, a problem that the World Health Organization has declared “one of the top 10 global public health threats facing humanity.”

As the new year approaches, many people discover a renewed enthusiasm for self-care and self-improvement. Georgia residents looking for guidance on matters of health, healthy relationships, financial literacy and more can count on University of Georgia Cooperative Extension for a wealth of resources to help reach those goals.

A drive-thru clinic to administer COVID-19 and flu vaccines held at the University of Georgia Griffin campus in late October was successful, with 91 members of the Griffin-Spalding community receiving vaccinations through the partnership between UGA-Griffin, UGA Cooperative Extension, the UGA College of Pharmacy and the local U-Save-It Pharmacy.

In the latter months of 2019, a novel coronavirus probably leaped from a yet-unknown animal in central China into a human. Some speculate that SARS-CoV-2 leaked from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. But evidence suggests that it’s far more likely that the virus was a natural “zoonotic” leap from animal to human. The resulting COVID-19 pandemic has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, including more than 23,000 Georgians, and mutated into dangerous new variants.