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Five more people who presumably contracted the bird flu are being tested amid outbreaks in California's dairy industry, health officials confirmed Monday. The five new possible positive cases are located in the state's Central Valley and are pending testing, according to the California Department of Health. There are total of six confirmed cases in the state as of Monday, the department said in a news release. (Robledo and Cuevas, 10/14)

Whooping cough cases have jumped sharply year over year but remain in line with pre-pandemic numbers, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Thursday. The CDC, which tracks whooping cough cases using a national surveillance system, noted that more than five times as many whooping cough cases have been reported this year as of Oct. 5, compared to the same time frame in 2023. The CDC reported 17,579 whooping cough cases in the U.S. through the week of Oct. 5. In October last year, that number was 3,962 – an increase of just over 13,600. (Martin, 10/14)

Galveston County health officials are emphasizing vaccination and education after several cases of whooping cough were confirmed by the county's health district Monday. Pertussis, often referred to as whooping cough, is a highly contagious bacterial infection accompanied by uncontrollable coughing spells. The cases highlight a significant increase in the volume of pertussis cases this year compared to 2023, when zero cases were recorded, according to a release by the Galveston County Health District. (Orozco, 10/14)

Several food items sold at some of the most popular U.S. grocery stores are included in a sweeping new recall of 9,986,245 pounds of meat and poultry products that may be contaminated with listeria, a bacteria that can cause illness in humans. BrucePac, a precooked meat producer, is recalling the items, which were produced from June 19 to Oct. 8 and have been distributed nationwide, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) said last week. Big-name outlets including Walmart, Target, Kroger and Trader Joe’s are among those affected by the recall. (Ables, 10/15)

Eleven people were hospitalized after they ate wild and apparently toxic mushrooms last week, a fire agency that serves Pennsylvania Dutch Country said. The patients in Peach Bottom Township were a man, a woman and nine children who were treated at a hospital and released, according to NBC affiliate WGAL of Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The township is in Dutch Country, which overlaps with Amish Country and shares culture and history, about 80 miles west of Philadelphia on Pennsylvania’s border with Maryland. (Romero, 10/14)

Passengers on more than 200 Delta Air Lines flights out of Detroit Metropolitan Airport were denied meal service over the weekend after the airline on Friday shut down its Detroit meal service facility. The closure came after the airline was notified of a "food safety issue" following a routine Food and Drug Administration inspection of the facility, Delta said. (Cerullo, 10/14)

Your nose may be more powerful than you think. In a single sniff, the human sense of smell can distinguish odors within a fraction of a second, working at a level of sensitivity that is “on par” with how our brains perceive color, “refuting the widely held belief that olfaction is our slow sense,” a new study finds. (Howard, 10/14)

It was a dramatic call to action by the American Heart Association: The organization declared its decade-long goal culminating in 2020 was to slash deaths from cardiovascular disease and stroke by 20%. It also promised in its scientific journal to move all Americans toward “ideal cardiovascular health.” That never happened. (Cooney, 10/15)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Journalists Talk Obesity, Oximeters, And Severe Weather's Impact On Public Health

�鶹Ů�� Health News and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media in recent weeks to discuss topical stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances. (10/12)