Module 4 : Section 1 - Immunity and Vaccinations

Question 1

Immunity can be…..

Answer 1

• Active
• passive

Question 2

What is active immunity

Answer 2

When your immune system makes its own antibodies after being stimulated by an antigen.

Question 3

What are the two types of active and passive immunity

Answer 3

• Natural
• artificial

Question 4

What is active natural immunity

Answer 4

• When you become immune after catching a disease
• e.g. you have measles or chickenpox so you shouldn’t be able to catch it in later life

Question 5

What is active artificial immunity

Answer 5

When you become immune after you’ve been give a vaccination containing a harmless dose of antigens

Question 6

What is passive immunity

Answer 6

The type of immunity you get from being given antibodies made by a different organism, your immune system doesn’t produce any antibodies of its own

Question 7

What is passive natural immunity

Answer 7

When a baby becomes immune due to the antibodies it receives from its mother, through the placenta and in breast milk (colostrum)

Question 8

Active immunity…

Answer 8

• requires exposure to antigen
• takes a while for protection to develop
• protection is long term
• memory cells are produced

Question 9

Passive immunity….

Answer 9

• doesn’t require exposure to antigen
• protection is immediate
• protection is short term
• memory cells aren’t produced

Question 10

What is passive artificial immunity

Answer 10

• When you become immune after being injected with antibodies from someone else.
• e.g. if if you contract tetanus you can be injected with antibodies against the tetanus toxin, which are collected from blood donations

Question 11

What happens when an organisms immune system isn’t able to recognise self-antigens

Answer 11

• The immune system treats the self-antigens as foreign antigens and launches an immune response against the organism’s own tissues.
• A disease resulting from this is known as autoimmune diseases
• autoimmune diseases are usually chronic, they can be treated but not cured

Question 12

Examples of autoimmune diseases

Answer 12

• lupus
• rheumatoid arthritis

Question 13

What is lupus

Answer 13

• caused by the immune system attacking cells in the connective tissue
• this damages the tissues and causes painful inflammation
• this can affect the skin, joints, and organs such as the heart or lungs

Question 14

What is rheumatoid arthritis

Answer 14

caused by the immune system attacking cells in the joints, this causes pain and inflammation

Question 15

How do vaccines work

Answer 15

They contain antigens (maybe free or attached to a attenuated or dead pathogen) that cause your body to produce memory cells against a particular pathogen without the pathogen causing disease - you become immune without getting any symptoms

Question 16

What happens when most people in a community are vaccinated

Answer 16

The disease becomes extremely rare. Even people who aren’t vaccinated are unlikely to get the disease because there’s no one to catch it from - called herd immunity

Question 17

What does herd immunity prevent

Answer 17

• epidemics
• mass outbreaks of disease

Question 18

Why are booster vaccines given

Answer 18

To make sure memory cells are produced later on in the event the pathogen comes back

Question 19

What is the difference in vaccination and immunisation

Answer 19

• Vaccination is the administration of antigens into the body. This causes immunisation
• Immunisation is the process by which you develop immunity

Question 20

Give examples of routine vaccines

Answer 20

MMR - protects against measles, mumps and rubella. Usually given to children as an injection when they are about a a year old, it contains attenuated measles mumps and rubella viruses

Meningitis C vaccine - protects against the bacteria that cause meningitis C. It is first given as an injection to babies at 3 months. Boosters are given to 1 year olds and teenagers

Question 21

Why does the influenza vaccine change every year

Answer 21

• because the antigens on the influenza virus mutate regularly forming new strains if the virus
• memory cells produced from vaccination with one strain of the flu will not recognise other strains with different antigens. They are immunologically distinct
• due to this a new vaccine has to be made