Vincent, Alan, Rich, and Kathy discuss recent outbreaks of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome in Yosemite National Park and novel swine-origin influenza in the US midwest, and isolation of the Heartland virus from two patients in Missouri with severe febrile illness.

A discussion of avian influenza H5N1 transmission experiments in ferrets and novel bunyaviruses at the 2012 Spring Conference of the Society for General Microbiology in Dublin, Ireland.

Vincent, Alan, and Rich explore a novel bunyavirus isolated in China, the recent polio outbreak in Republic of the Congo, and cell to cell transmission of a retrovirus by biofilm-like extracellular assemblies.

Vincent, Alan, and Stephen Morse discuss progressive vaccinia in a smallpox vaccinee, arsenic and influenza in mice, facemasks and flu transmission, and antigenic and genetic analyses of the new H1N1 influenza virus.