Disease Flashcards
(76 cards)
1
Q
What is a disease?
A
Something that makes you ill
2
Q
What does endemic mean?
A
Always present in an area
3
Q
What is an epidemic?
A
An unexpected and widespread rise in disease - usually confined to a geographical area
4
Q
What is a pandemic?
A
When many countries are affected
Kelly 2011
5
Q
What is a vector?
A
A carrier of a disease
6
Q
What is a host?
A
Where species of pathogen live and replicate
7
Q
What is zoonosis?
A
When a disease can be transmitted between animals and humans
8
Q
What is a spill over event? How does it differ to zoonosis?
A
- When a disease that was once transmitted among animals becomes transmissible among humans
- Spill over is when a disease always transmits from animals to humans, eg bovine TB
9
Q
When did spill overs become more common?
A
After the Neolithic revolution and the move towards agriculture - more intimate interaction between humans and animals
10
Q
What other coronavirus have there been in recent years?
A
- SARs in 2003
- MERs 2012-present
- COVID-19
11
Q
What is a good paper linking malaria to climate change?
A
Caminade et al 2016
12
Q
What study considered what will cause a pandemic before covid happened?
A
Adalja et al 2018
13
Q
What makes a successful pandemic?
A
A pathogen which suits a niche of human society (Green 2020 - covid in urban, global soc)
14
Q
Why are absolute counts of disease prevalence misleading and less useful?
A
- Misses the size of the overall population and the number of people at risk
- By ignoring proportions makes it hard to consider the probability of catching or dyeing from a disease
- overlooks unequal social and biological vulnerabilities
15
Q
Why is rate of infection useful?
A
Rate per 1000 better for comparison between different places and groups
16
Q
What is the difference between prevalence and incidence?
A
Prevalence = % pop with cases
Incidence = New (what is the threshold?) cases per n of population
17
Q
What are 3 flaws with using R numbers to show incidence of disease?
A
- Hard to measure exposure
- Don’t know who is carrying it (asymptomatic)
- Not everyone is equally susceptible
18
Q
What is the difference between mortality and fatality rates?
A
Mortality rate = deaths/ popn
Fatality rate = deaths/ # cases
Fatality rate depends on health etc, so varied across space more
19
Q
What constitutes a case?
A
- Lab-confirmed tests (not always available, so often underestimates)
- Symptom diagnosis
- Asymptomatic cases overlooked
20
Q
When did surveys of infectious diseases in the UK become compulsory?
A
1899 - Drs needed to tell local authorities (still the case for several diseases NHS 2022)
21
Q
What is a limitation of using deaths to measure disease spread/increases?
A
- Deaths easier to count than cases
BUT - The metrics vary - deaths since positive test?
- Other deaths usually go down during lockdowns
- Data can be patchy in some countries
22
Q
Why are social influences and determinants of heath called “distal causes”?
A
They take place away from the body
23
Q
Is it always the case that the very young and very old experience severe disease?
A
No, sometimes other demographic groups do too - e.g. with the Spanish flu
Normally the relationship between age and incidence is J-Shaped
24
Q
What are two of the most immediate responses in pandemics?
A
Treating the sick and stopping the spread
25
What is the SIR model? What are the two main problems with it?
- Model showing that herd immunity can be reached
- Only works if the disease is mild and there is some degree of existing immunity
- Also flawed if immunity is short lived
FIND A CITATION
26
What is the idea behind "flattening the curve"?
To spread out aggregate infections so that the healthcare capacity is not overwhelmed
27
Can the same treatment be used for all diseases?
No, it depends on the type of pathogen
28
How were diseases treated during the middle ages?
- The four humours - essentially used disease causation to decide treatments
- Caused more harm than good
CITATION?
29
How was miasmic theory used in wider contexts?
Used to explain need to exclude cattle and animals from cities over fears that they could harbour disease through smells - smells did not correspond with "perfect" urban modernism
(Philo, 1995)
30
What was the issue with miasmic theory?
- It wrongly attributed disease to smells, but inadvertently led to the right responses
- Good example of causal affect really
31
Alongside treatments, what can be done to tackle pandemics?
- Prevention - airborne diseases are the hardest to stop
| - Isolation to separate individuals
32
What is the difference between quarantine and cordon sanitaire?
Quarantine = those exposed but not yet ill
Cordon sanitaire = keeping infected communities isolated together
33
Is social distancing a new idea with covid?
No, it was also used for the 1918 flu pandemic
34
Where was cordon sanitaire used with covid?
- In Wuhan at the start
| - Qatar migrant workers kept isolated from everyone else (Iskender, 2020)
35
Who has conducted a comparison between covid 19 and the 1918 flu pandemic?
Honisbaum 2021
36
What factor is often overlooked when it comes to pandemic preparation?
Interventions are socially and economically previsioned and dependent (underinvestment in NHS in the UK)
37
What is the problem now with the lack of vaccines at the start of the rollout?
There are "Vaccine deserts"
38
Who has said that spread of misinformation was not a significant reason for poor vaccine uptakes?
Roberts et al 2021
39
What is a success and limitation of the covid vaccine rollout?
- Never before has a vaccine controlled a novel infection
| - The rollout has been uneven
40
What was the deadliest pandemic? Where does covid rank? What data?
- Black death deadliest (1/3-half world popn)
- Covid 7th based on mortality
- The ranking is based on number of deaths, not proportion of people or cases
SOURCE?
41
What is a long-term impact of pandemics?
Life expectancy decreases (1 year for covid, 10 years for spanish flu worldwide)
42
Why does life expectancy fall then rebound after pandemics?
Life expectancy represents expected duration of life at birth, so the change is short term only whilst the pandemic is occurring
43
Why did Spanish flu see a greater reduction in life expectancy than covid?
- It affected young children too, so pulled the average down
| - Also road traffic accident decreases counter-acted covid death increases
44
Give 3 examples of impacts of pandemics
1. Black death causing economic growth at end of Feudalism (Pamuk 2007)
2. Spanish flu causing social legistation which legalised adoption in the UK 1926 (Spinney 2018)
3. Flar et al 2022 and the gendered effects of covid lockdowns in the UK
45
Do the impacts of pandemics occur in isolation?
No, history preconditions the effects, as Bambra et al 2021 show for austerity, neoliberalism, existing health issues all aggravating Covid 19 in the UK
46
What was the main cause of death from Spanish flu?
Hypoxia caused by heliotrope cyanosis
47
Why as the 1918 flu pandemic called Spanish flu?
- Spain was neutral during WW1, so did not affect the war status
- Most likely emerged in Camp Funston, USA
48
What is a cynical side of Spanish flu?
It was weaponised to control indigenous populations
49
Why was, until recently, the 1918 flu pandemic overlooked?
| 3 reasons
- War was more important at the time, so eclipsed the pandemic
- War has winners, illnesses do not have clear winners
- No definitive end to pandemics
See Spinney, 2017
50
Where are the majority of Black Death cases estimated to be nowadays?
90% estimated to be in Africa (Stenseth et al 2008)
51
When did Spanish flu start?
Spring 1918 (CDC 2019)
52
Why is a one-size-fits-all approach of limited use to diseases like Dengue?
There are many social, political and biogeograhical aspects to the disease in varying intensities in different place
53
Why does climate change offer several possible outcomes for diseases like dengue and malaria?
- There will be temperature and precipitation changes, each different spatially
- Less rainfall in some places could mean not enough areas of mosquitos to breed
- Much heavier rainfall could also disrupt breeding sites
IPCC 2013
54
What societal impacts in the UK came with the 2014 Ebola outbreak?
Racism and Xenophobia increased
Kim et al 2016
55
When did malaria originate and where?
Malaria originated in Africa 17000 years ago (Packard 2021)
56
Where are the most cases of Malaria today?
90% are in Sub-Saharan Africa (Webb 2015)
57
How much does Malaria cost to the global economy each year?
$12 billion / year (Tuteja 2007)
58
Why are antimalarials less effective today?
The Malaria Plasmodium parasite is developing resistance to them
(Kongstad 1996; also Medicines for Malaria Venture 2021)
59
When was the first vaccine that is 75% effective against Malaria developed?
In 2021 by Oxford (WHO 2021)
60
How were antimalarials militarised?
Prescribed to families so that they could travel to Tropical regions with husbands so that colonisation could take place (locals did not benefit, Gandy 2014)
Arnold 2000 great overview in Tropicality; see also Harrison 1996; Baber 2016 for antimalarial families
61
Who has done a good political economic analysis into Malaria and colonialism?
Packard 1984
- Malaria in colonial Swaziland
- Land use change because of external forces of capital
- Forced existing tribal groups to move to the Lowveld marshland areas
62
How many people die of Malaria yearly?
1.1-2.7 million Webb 2015
63
Who has highlighted that climate change poses a threat to Malaria incidence?
Foley et al 2005
64
How many people died of Malaria in 2020?
627,000 (CDC 2021)
65
What genus of Mosquito is a vector for Malaria?
Anopheles (CDC 2021)
66
What is relapsing Malaria?
When the disease returns after 4 years because parasites can reside dormant in the liver for 4 years (CDC 2021)
67
Why can people catch Malaria several times?
Without frequent exposure to the parasite, immunity wanes rapidly (CDC 2021)
68
How does Malaria prevention link to philanthrocapitalism?
- An eradication program started in the 1950s
- Failed because of insecticide resistance, antimalarial resistance and admin issues
- Also did not address the disease in Africa, where it is most prevalent
(CDC 2021 - links to Methodological issues with Philanthrocapitalism CITATION?)
69
Where are the two main antimalarials sourced from? Why are they significant?
- Artemisinin and quinine
- Derived from Qinghao plants and the cinchona tree bark, respectively
- Links to colonialism and exploitation of natures at frontiers to further enhance the frontier machine
(MMV 2021)
70
Why is antimalarial resistance of concern?
Artemisinin-based combination therapy - a previously robust antimalarial first detected resistance in 2009
(MMV 2021)
71
Why do people in the west have a "prejudice against swamps"?
Because of diseases like malaria in the Fens and elsewhere
Boyce 2021
72
How does Malaria reflect colonial exceptionalism?
- “We tend to think of malaria… with imperial arrogance… not something the English had, but part of the colonial experience”
- Also in the Fens
Boyce 2021
73
What is an arbovirus?
Viruses transmitted to humans by mosquito vectors
74
Despite the issues climate change raises about diseases and epidemics, why is there hope?
There are solutions and methods of interventions
Singh and Purohit 2014 - lacks social critique of causes though
75
What is a good example of a disease affecting one place more than another? Why?
- Chikungunya and zika virus impacts more in (South) Americas
- Not just because these viruses have been endemic in these areas recently...
- Insufficient surveillance in other regions
- Americas lack immunity
Puntasecca et al 2021
76
What is a good way of illustrating Western Conceptualisation of risk?
- Kelly 2011 article on defining pandemics
- Even though does not consider globalisation, highlights outdated "global occurrence" definition of pandemics
- About reflecting on past evidence to come to a new judgement, not considering all possible scenarios
