Click here for the October 2025 revision to the remote activities policy.

Fatal drug poisoning (“overdose”) is a growing public health crisis in the United States. According to the United States National Vital Statistics System, 105,007 drug overdose deaths occurred in 2023. Whereas opioids (including prescription opioids, heroin, fentanyl and analogs) were the leading cause of overdose deaths, the pharmacological composition of drugs has evolved into a “polysubstance death” crisis.  

Dr. Denise Kay, Director of the New York State Newborn Screening Program at the Wadsworth Center, was invited to present at the 2025 North American Cystic Fibrosis Conference, held October 22–25 in Seattle, Washington.

Dr. Kurunthachalam Kannan from the Division of Environmental Health Sciences (DEHS) at the Wadsworth Center, has been invited to serve on the Overdose Biosurveillance Task Force (OBTF), an advisory group charged by the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) Board of Directors to provide subject matter expertise and input into the creation, dissemination, and promotion of resources for public health laboratories developing and conducting overdose biosurveillance programs in response to the evolving overdose epidemic. 

Click here for application and information about the program. Association of Public Health Laboratories 2026 Internship Flyer

The Safe Drinking Water Act sets stringent standards for the detection of radioactive contaminants in public water systems. A new study from the Wadsworth Center’s Nuclear Chemistry Laboratory explores how these requirements might be exceeded through improved analytical sensitivity.

The Wadsworth Center’s Mycobacteriology Laboratory was contacted by the Texas Department of State Health Services to perform drug susceptibility testing for a transplant recipient previously treated for pre-extensively drug-resistant (XDR) tuberculosis beginning in 2022. After nine months of therapy, the patient was initially deemed cured following a treatment regimen consisting of bedaquiline, pretomanid, and linezolid (BPaL)—currently the standard for managing multidrug- and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR/XDR-TB).

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The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) held its annual Newborn Screening Symposium from October 5–9 in Providence, Rhode Island, bringing together approximately 570 scientists and healthcare professionals from across the United States and around the world. The symposium addressed a broad range of topics critical to public health newborn screening systems, including enhanced biochemical and molecular screening technologies; methods for detecting new conditions; quality improvement initiatives; strateg

Dr. Joseph Orsini, Deputy Director of the Newborn Screening Program at the Wadsworth Center, has been honored with the 2025 George Cunningham Visionary Award in Newborn Screening. This prestigious lifetime achievement award recognizes individuals working in U.S.

The Wadsworth Center’s Mycology Laboratory has developed an in-house MALDI-TOF MS (matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization - time of flight mass spectrometry) library comprising rare yeast species, which is now one of the contributed databases available through the CDC’s MicrobeNet platform.

Approximately half of all cases of reported infertility in the United States involve malefactor, which is commonly diagnosed via standardized analysis of semen quality parameters that include sperm concentration, motility, and morphology.  

The New York State Newborn Screening Program housed at the Wadsworth Center was the first program in the U.S. to implement screening for sickle cell disease in 1975. Sickle cell disease is an inherited blood disorder affecting hemoglobin, the major protein that carries oxygen in red blood cells. The abnormal hemoglobin causes sickle-shaped red blood cells that can break down prematurely and/or block blood flow, leading to anemia, pain, infections, and other severe complications. Sickle cell disease affects more than 100,000 people in the U.S.

September is designated as Public Health Laboratory Appreciation Month. Wadsworth Center proudly joined the Association of Public Health Laboratories and colleagues nationwide in honoring the vital role these laboratories—and every individual within them—play in protecting public health. 

Read the New York State Department of Health Press Release.

Read the Association of Public Health Laboratories' Blog post spotlighting Wadsworth Center scientist Jean Rock.

In August, Brooke Clemons of the Parasitology Laboratory and Kiran Mall of the Protein Expression and Biochemistry Core Laboratories graduated from the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) Emerging Leader Program (ELP), Cohort 18.  They were selected as two of 25 participants nationwide for this yearlong program designed to cultivate leadership skills among laboratory professionals from state and local public health laboratories.  

The Wadsworth Center Biodefense Laboratory has been awarded $125,000 to develop, optimize, and validate threat-agnostic sequencing workflows for the rapid detection of pathogens in respiratory and other specimens. This project represents a critical step in strengthening New York State’s laboratory readiness and capacity to respond to infectious disease threats.  The initiative will integrate metagenomic and targeted sequencing methods with the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Basestack software, including its TaxTriage module. 

Minneapolis, MN | September 7-9, 2025 – Dr. Norma Tavakoli, PhD, of the Wadsworth Center was a featured speaker at the Congenital Cytomegalovirus (cCMV) Public Health and Policy Conference, hosted by the University of Minnesota.  Her presentation, “A Pilot Study in New York State to Screen Newborns for Congenital Cytomegalovirus,” highlighted groundbreaking work conducted by the New York State Newborn Screening Program.  

The New York State Newborn Screening Program at the Wadsworth Center has become the first program in the United States to implement universal newborn screening for Metachromatic Leukodystrophy (MLD), a devastating but now treatable lysosomal storage disorder.  MLD is caused by low or absent activity of the arylsulfatase A (ARSA) enzyme, leading to toxic accumulation of sulfatides and progressive damage to the nervous system.