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Amid an escalating bird flu outbreak spreading in the United States, federal health officials have begun to brief members of the incoming Trump administration about how they’ve responded to the crisis so far. “We sent them all of the information on our work,” said a Biden administration health official familiar with transition briefings within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Lovelace Jr., Edwards and Khimm, 1/14)

The Biden administration on Tuesday released a “roadmap” for maintaining government defenses against infectious diseases, just as President-elect Donald Trump pledges to dismantle some of them. The 16-page report recaps steps taken in the last four years against COVID-19, mpox and other diseases, including vaccination efforts and the use of wastewater and other measures to spot signs of erupting disease outbreaks. (Stobbe, 1/14)

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (LACDPH) yesterday reported three more H5 avian flu infections in pet cats after exposure to raw food or raw milk. In other avian flu developments, federal officials confirmed those and several more H5N1 detections in domestic cats from California and other states. (Schnirring, 1/14)

China has reported to more human infections involving H9N2 avian influenza, which involve children from two different provinces, Hong Kong’s Centre for Health Protection (CHP) said in its latest weekly avian influenza update. The patients include a 1-year-old girl from the city of Chongqing whose symptoms began on December 13, 2024, and an 8-year-old girl from Hubei province who got sick on November 27, 2024. The report did not say how the patients were exposed, but H9N2 infections are typically reported in people who have contact with poultry or poultry environments. (Schnirring, 1/14)

This winter's wave of norovirus infections has reached levels that are now more than double last season's peak, in figures published Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tracking the notorious stomach bug. Nearly 28% of norovirus tests run over the week of the New Year's holiday came back positive for the highly contagious virus, which is the leading cause of foodborne illness like vomiting and diarrhea in the U.S. (Tin, 1/14)

A study yesterday in JAMA Pediatrics suggests that even the kids who get most sick from an uncommon but serious condition that affects multiple organ systems after COVID-19 infections recover fully by 6 months after infection. The retrospective cohort study followed outcomes seen among pediatric patients diagnosed as having multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) associated with COVID-19 infection, one of the most severe outcomes seen during the pandemic. (Soucheray, 1/14)