{"id":9664,"date":"2022-08-08T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-08T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/?p=9664"},"modified":"2022-08-05T16:38:59","modified_gmt":"2022-08-05T20:38:59","slug":"this-bug-is-wreaking-havoc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/2022\/08\/08\/this-bug-is-wreaking-havoc\/","title":{"rendered":"This Bug Is Wreaking Havoc"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Patricia Pavlinac \u201905 is helping to find solutions to aid children in Africa and South Asia fight a life-threatening illness. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n


<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Patricia Pavlinac \u201905 pops into the Zoom window, she has to fix her username, which still appears as \u201cShigella<\/em>\u201d from an earlier meeting. Nobody wants this bacterium as a guest. But Pavlinac \u2014 an assistant professor in the University of Washington\u2019s Global Center for Integrated Health of Women, Adolescents, and Children \u2014 has Shigella<\/em> on her mind all the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Globally, this infection is the second-leading cause of diarrhea. It\u2019s estimated to kill more than 200,000 people each year, including more than 60,000 children under the age of 5.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A parent in the United States doesn\u2019t usually have to worry that their child may die of diarrhea. But in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia, \u201cThat is a very real risk,\u201d Pavlinac says. That\u2019s why she has her focus on Shigella<\/em> and other major causes of diarrheal illness. If the world paid more attention to these threats, it could make a huge difference in the lives of children and their families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pavlinac first became interested in infectious diseases, and especially in disparities among the treatments that patients can access in different parts of the world, when she joined the Peace Corps after graduating from Colgate. In low- and middle-income countries, she says, a lack of clean water and sanitation can mean there are more dangerous microbes around. Underlying conditions such as malnutrition or HIV may make young kids more vulnerable when they encounter those microbes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The infection itself isn\u2019t the only dangerous thing about Shigella<\/em>. \u201cThis is just one of those bugs that puts itself in your intestines and wreaks all sorts of havoc,\u201d Pavlinac explains. It can cause dysentery, or bloody diarrhea. The damage it does to the gut can leave children more prone to malnutrition afterward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMany of us naively assume diarrheal disease is really simple,\u201d Pavlinac says. Doctors and scientists understand the basics of what causes diarrhea and how to treat kids who get dehydrated. However, she says, that understanding has \u201cginormous gaps.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, hospitals in low- and middle-income countries may not have the resources to test a child who shows up with serious diarrhea and figure out what virus, bacterium, or parasite is causing it. \u201cDoctors are going blindly in terms of how to treat the underlying cause of diarrhea,\u201d Pavlinac says, and are cautious about providing antibiotics because they increase the risk of antibiotic resistance. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s why some scientists are working to develop rapid tests for diarrheal illnesses, Pavlinac says. In her own research, she\u2019s studying whether identifying which kids have Shigella<\/em>, then treating those kids judiciously with antibiotics, can improve their chances. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe would never advocate for willy-nilly antibiotic use,\u201d Pavlinac says. But early results suggest that targeting the drugs to high-risk children with Shigella<\/em> infections improves their outlook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To prevent those infections from happening in the first place, Pavlinac is also working with research teams around the world to prepare for clinical trials of Shigella<\/em> vaccines that other research groups are developing now. Although Shigella<\/em> diarrhea is not a new disease, Pavlinac says momentum has built in recent years to finally develop Shigella<\/em> vaccines for children. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even more recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has made the general public more familiar with the science of infectious diseases. \u201cThat\u2019s been really nice,\u201d Pavlinac says. \u201cBefore, when I would say I\u2019m an epidemiologist, people would say, \u2018Oh, you study the epidermis!\u2019\u201d She also thinks people recognize now that infectious diseases don\u2019t just affect people who get sick \u2014 they can reverberate through entire world economies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pavlinac\u2019s own work was recognized last year by the Washington Global Health Alliance. In its first ever Global Health Impact Awards, the group granted Pavlinac the Rising Star Award, for an individual age 40 or younger who\u2019s making a major difference in global health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pavlinac says it \u201cfeels critical\u201d to use her voice to highlight the importance of this research area, as well as the often-unrecognized work of her collaborators in parts of the world where Shigella<\/em> takes the greatest toll. \u201cThe uplifting part is what a gift it is that we can be, hopefully, one small part of the solution,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n


<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Patricia Pavlinac \u201905 is helping to find solutions to aid children in Africa and South Asia fight a life-threatening illness. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1260,"featured_media":9667,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1052,1056,1055,1058,1057,1059,1060,1049,1053,1050,1054,1051],"coauthors":[595],"class_list":["post-9664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-discover","tag-africa","tag-antibiotic","tag-diarrhea","tag-epidimiologist","tag-epidimiology","tag-global-health","tag-health-award","tag-illness","tag-infectious-diseases","tag-life-threatening","tag-peace-corps","tag-south-asia"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-2vS","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2022\/07\/Davis-Colgate-Pavlinac-Feature.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1260"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9664"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10188,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9664\/revisions\/10188"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9664"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}