Infectious disease

Influenza, probably best known as "the flu”, is an infectious respiratory disease. Although the disease is often mild, it can also be life-threatening and causes serious infection and death each year, usually in the winter months. 250,000-500,000 deaths annually occur due to influenza viruses1–3. Particularly elderly people, people with a weakened immune system and people with pre-existing respiratory, cardiac and endocrine diseases are affected by complications3. Due to some pre-existing…

The History of Smallpox Smallpox once covered the globe. In Europe alone, 400,000 people a year use to die from it. It used to be extremely infectious. Smallpox started with little brown dots on your skin called macules. After a while each little dot raised up into a bump called a papule. Three or four days later, each papule became a blister called a pustule, a hard round bead under the skin. The patient’s whole body was covered in these, but especially his face, hands and feet. Sometimes…

Epidemiology Exercise 1. Briefly describe the natural history of the disease in the outbreak; its progression from onset (exposure) to resolution. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (2012b), the natural history of the disease refers to the course of a disease from its onset until resolution or death occurs. For the purpose of this question, I will discuss the natural of history of the disease focusing on patient zero. Other’s exposed had variation in the length of…

beneficial to the participants and their communities and do no harm, or nonmaleficence. To ensure beneficence, a drug or immunization for Ebola must benefit the most affected communities and have the potential to effectively reduce the burden of disease. It would not be ethical to conduct a study that could harm the community or participants in some way. Respect for persons would also be necessary for clinical trials of an Ebola therapy. Potential participants should always have the autonomy to…

for trade. If a rat was a host to a flea carrying the deadly bacterium, the rat would most likely die within 14 days. In order to survive, the fleas would then turn to human hosts. This is how the plague spread. Once the bacterium was present, the disease took three to five days to develop. In 80% of cases, the human host would die within another three to five days. Interestingly enough, it took quite a while for people to realize that an epidemic was breaking through. For example, in small…

important to people’s health to prevent diseases and keep people’s children safe and healthy. Vaccinations can save people’s lives and protect the people we care about. Vaccinations protect people from diseases that have killed thousands and eliminates diseases by receiving the vaccine. An example would be small pox , an infectious disease that was eliminated by people becoming aware of its affects and receiving the vaccination. Vaccinations protect people from diseases that may cause the…

a contagious viral infection that usually affects the respiratory passages, causes severe symptoms, and can occur in an epidemic. An epidemic is the slow spread of an infectious disease to a large number of people in a population within a short period of time (Wikipedia). A pandemic is an epidemic outbreak of an infectious disease that can spread through populations and even worldwide. Since 1918, there have been four influenza pandemics. From 1918 to 1919, the Spanish flu (H1N1) spread…

Similarities and Differences Between Chickenpox and Shingles Chickenpox, also known as varicella and Shingles both are a viral infectious diseases that causes itchy rash and blisters or red spots. The rash of Shingles usually appears on the right or left part of the face or the body in a single line, while Chickenpox occurs in the whole body. Chickenpox is often found in children, while Shingles also known as zoster, is more common among adults. Individuals who have had chickenpox…

that increases the risk of CD from endemic to non-endemic countries. CD has become a global concern. Prevalence of CD is more in migrants than that of blood donors. There is a need of high-quality epidemiological studies to estimates prevalence of disease. They concluded that enhance surveillance and reporting are needed for control efforts. So…

tuberculosis was not an ‘inherited disease’ (as it was thought at the time) but a bacterium, and was infectious (a scientist named Villemin demonstrated its was contagious but had no solid evidence to back him up). To prove that his theory was correct, Koch used a test which he had devised in his study of anthrax (now) called ‘Koch’s postulates.’ He used guinea pigs to evaluate these postulates on, as they required a host (infected with tuberculosis) to pass on the disease to an uninfected…