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It is that time of year when we present listicles of our top 5 or 10. Here are our most popular articles based on your page views. On behalf of myself and all of our wonderful writers, thank you for all 400,000 reads.

As the fall approaches, the Delta variant continues to infect our citizens as the climate becomes more hospitable to respiratory viruses. Booster immunizations have arrived, and they’ll be rolled out soon.

The arrival of the next pandemic is a matter of when, not if. In order to be prepared for it, we will need government-funded basic science in universities and the collaboration of drug companies experienced in vaccine research and development. A "universal" vaccine – one that protects against infections by both existing and new variants – would be an important advance.

Another norovirus vaccine bites the dust. This time, it's HilleVax's HIL-214, which provided an appalling 5% efficacy in Phase 2B trials in infants. The kids got sick, but perhaps the stockholders got even sicker. Read this and you'll see why.

Beginning around 1940, we began to see infectious diseases that were previously unknown. But where did they come from? You can either read the article or we'll just give you a hint: animals. (And we're talking about some real doozies.)

Antiviral drug development for COVID-19 took a back seat to vaccines during the brief time – when we thought that ending the pandemic was simply a matter of getting enough needles in enough arms. But the virus had other ideas: variants. Now it's looking like we may need a drug to complement the vaccines. Three are in development. Here's a look at Pfizer's PF-07321332. It should work, but don't hold me to that.

Politically-driven vaccine resistance renders persuasion efforts all but futile in that segment of the population. A different, but still potent, obstacle is posed when trying to persuade those susceptible to conspiracy theories. What happens when the two tactics are deliberately and calculatedly used in tandem – facilitated by junk science? Might perpetuating this kind of compound disinformation count as treason if done by a public servant?

From the very beginning, the FDA knew that the COVID-19 vaccine was linked to serious heart trouble in recipients. The FDA medical officer review [1] of Pfizer’s original COVID-19 application notes “clinically important serious adverse reactions [included] anaphylaxis and myocarditis/pericarditis.” There is an urgent need for the FDA, CDC, and manufacturers to thoroughly investigate serious heart-related adverse events after the Pfizer and Moderna COVID vaccines.

According to a recent report from the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), experts are questioning the utility of current hospital practices designed to fight the spread of MRSA methicillin-resistant Staphlococcus aureus, also known as a superbug .

Antibiotic resistance is spotty. If you are hospitalized in New York and you acquire a Gram-negative infection in the hospital, there is a reasonable chance it will be caused by a highly resistant pathogen. If you go to a hospital in New Hampshire or Vermont, there is almost no chance for that to happen. ACSH advisor Dr. David Shlaes explains.

A Texas wedding this past April became an unintentional experiment in vaccine efficacy. All 92 guests were vaccinated but COVID disease broke through in six people. Four of them got one of the mRNA vaccines and developed one mild illness. Two got Covaxin, a vaccine developed in India. Both became very ill and one subsequently died. The culprit was the dangerous delta variant.

Contrary to a poorly researched Wall Street Journal commentary, the new COVID vaccines have been tested appropriately and, like their predecessors, will likely prevent serious illness, death, and undue stress on the U.S. healthcare system.

What would happen if we approached antibiotic resistance with the same fervor that we have for covid? Is there a reason why we should not?

Upper respiratory infections have a seasonality; winter is their thing. The role of the changing temperature and humidity, in some entangled manner, contributes to the winter increases. But what is the role of one of our first barriers to those invading microbes, the nose?

We at ACSH have warned repeatedly about the nightmarish scenario that continues to unfold as more and more bacteria become resistant to previously-effective antibiotics, bringing us to the precipice of the pre-penicillin era where common infections such as strep throat and pneumonia were killers.

Roughly 70% of Americans have gotten or plan to get vaccinated – a percentage that has not changed since June. The public remains divided between those that fear the virus and its consequences and those who fear the vaccination.

The Agency's drug approval and enforcement actions are falling through the cracks, while regulators are squandering time and resources on insubstantial trivia.

Everyone take a deep breath and relax. During these crazy times, people are making all kinds of wild predictions about what drug or vaccine will work. Dr. David Shlaes takes a sobering look at the chances for any of these therapies to work. It's not as easy as you'd think. We should all lower our expectations a bit.

Vaccine skeptics continue to insist that the COVID shots are dangerous. As always, their favorite sources are the federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) and other similar passive surveillance databases. As cases of supposed vaccine injury are investigated, we come to the reassuring, though admittedly boring, conclusion that COVID-19 jabs pose a low risk to most people.

Two new studies, one published in Science and the other in Nature, by one of the pioneers of the CRISPR-Cas9 technique show the power and specificity of the genome-editing technique.

When a gene is copied into a strand of RNA, the DNA in and around the gene must be loosened from its packaged state. Then, Spt6 helps DNA become re-wound when the copying process is completed. It also facilitates RNA degradation. This may lead to ways to understand disease.

The FDA just voted to approve a different Covid vaccine; this one based on one of the Omicron subvariants. But the decision was anything but simple. A look at the science.

If you think ozone is just up there in the sky somewhere, think again. It's also being used more and more to combat bacteria and infections, like MRSA. So the next time the conversation turns to ozone, it's good to know the context before you weigh in. And so that you can look knowledgeable here's your quick overview. 

So far, 11 different variants of COVID-19 have been identified and assigned a Greek letter for identification. Although delta (originally from India) is making all kinds of trouble worldwide, it will eventually be replaced by something worse. All the more reason to get vaccinated now.

ACSH advisor Dr. David Shlaes, a world-renowned expert on antibiotics and the bacteria that are increasingly resistant to them, encourages all of us to watch Frontline tonight at 10 EST. They are covering a topic that you