Source: ezinearticles.com
We have all heard and read about the recent outbreak of influenza throughout the world. Different people call the disease causing the outbreak H1N1 flu, Swine flu, or Mexican flu. They use the names interchangeably. When something this widespread threatens this many people, some of us wonder how we recognize when many people are made sick by new organisms, which government agencies or other institutions identify the cause, predict the severity, and attempt to prevent and ameliorate the potential spread of the disease.
An understanding, sars face mask , of words like outbreak, epidemic, and pandemic, which all mean different things, and are often used interchangeably, makes it easier to understand the information we see, hear, or read.
This article provides basic answers to these questions and provides sources of more detailed in-depth information.
Recently, cases of H1N1 flu have been described as an outbreak, an epidemic, and the pandemic. All three words are applicable, but they all mean different things.
Outbreak
An outbreak is when a disease, like H1N1 flu, occurs more frequently than normal in a geographic area, country, or time of year. It is considered an outbreak as long as the number of illnesses caused by a specific disease exceeds the expected number of illnesses as determined based on historical data.
An outbreak can be one, a few, or millions of cases of disease. If the one case is an unknown disease, or was thought to have been eradicated, the one case will be considered an outbreak. One outbreak of relatively few cases occurred in the 1980s when flesh eating Strep A infections began to appear.
Some diseases,, sars face mask , such as tuberculosis, are considered so dangerous, contagious, and potentially harmful, that a health care provider is legally required to report, sars face mask , these patients who have the disease to the local Department of Health Services.
Epidemic
When a specific infectious disease spreads rapidly to many people we call it an epidemic. A recent epidemic occurred in 2003, when severe acute respiratory syndrome, also known as SARS, killed many people and made countless others severely ill. An epidemic is characterized primarily by the speed, sars face mask , of spread of infection. In other words, an epidemic exists when the number of cases spreads faster than normal within a demographic group or geographic area. An epidemic can occur within a confined area, a specific patient group, or as a result, sars face mask , of an isolated patient, sars face mask , called morbidity or other risk factor.
Pandemic
A pandemic is basically an epidemic which spreads throughout the world. In a sense it is a worldwide epidemic, although technically, a pandemic can lack the quick spread of disease which characterizes an epidemic.
There have been multiple flu pandemics. Spanish flu killed many million people almost 100, sars face mask , years ago. Some of us are old enough to remember when Asian flu killed more than one million people in the late 1950s. Even more of us will remember, sars face mask , the Hong Kong flu which caused over one million deaths in the late 1960s.
These pandemics are caused by new viruses within the influenza group. Because they are new, humans have no immunity to them and the, sars face mask , world population is at risk for infection by them.
Both pandemics and epidemics are typically, although not exclusively, airborne diseases which spread easily and quickly from person to person through coughing, sneezing, or hand to mouth or nose contact. As people have become more mobile,, sars face mask , and are better able to travel throughout the world, it becomes easier for outbreaks of disease to spread globally, becoming pandemics
Recognizing deviations requires collecting, maintaining, and analyzing, reliable data about diseases. Without this data, it would be impossible to know when a disease is occurring, sars face mask , significantly more often than we would expect historically.
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization, also known as WHO, tracks disease caused by flu organisms. It obtains information from countries throughout the world. By analyzing the information, the World Health Organization is able to quantify the risk of a flu related disease becoming a flu pandemic. It has developed a scale which rates the risk of a flu pandemic from 1, a low risk; to 6,, sars face mask , an out and out of pandemic throughout the world.
At the low risk end of the scale, the World Health Organization identifies a virus in animals which does not cause disease in humans. The risk increases as human, sars face mask , cases of infection are identified, small clusters of the new disease are located, multiple but isolated, sars face mask , populations of humans are affected by the new disease, then the new flu disease is transmitted between the once isolated populations of infection. Finally, the new disease is recognized as a full-blown pandemic when it is identified in different countries in different regions within the World Health Organization geographic classifications of the world.
Center for Disease Control The CDC uses its own severity index to quantify and stratify the severity of outbreaks of disease. The Index allows the CDC to project an estimate the number of expected deaths from the outbreak. The information it generates is used much like the hurricane Index which allows communities to prepare for hurricanes. It allows preparation for disease, sars face mask , outbreak and treatment planning.
Both the risk of illness and the risk of death are tracked by the World Health Organization, and other national organizations which work in consort with it.
Multiple factors influence the risk of death in a pandemic. These include, but are not limited to, the number of people infected, the general health conditions in the location where people are infected, the severity and virulence of the organism causing the infection, the vulnerability and relative immunity or lack of immunity to the organism within affected populations, the timeliness of steps to prevent dissemination of the disease, and the effectiveness of the steps taken, timely or otherwise.
Vaccination, is the main mechanism used to slow the spread of disease during a flu outbreak, which hopefully prevents either epidemic or pandemic. Effective vaccinations require identification of the specific organism causing the illness. How long it takes to identify the organism depends on a variety of things.
Identifying the organism, creating the vaccinations serum, informing the affected population, and vaccinating sufficient numbers of people to slow the spread of disease are primarily activities undertaken by scientists at a global or national level.
Protect Yourself There are other things, however, which any concerned person can do to minimize their own risk of becoming infected. These are things parents can tell their children, and teachers can tell their students.
One of the best and most basic defenses to illness is washing your hands often with soap and water. Hand cleaners or gel sanitizers are good substitutes if soap is not available.
Stay out of crowded places as much as possible. Don't touch your mouth and nose or eyes with your hands unless you wash your hands with soap and water immediately before doing so. Cover your mouth if you cough or sneeze. In extreme cases you may want to consider wearing face masks in public, particularly in crowded confined spaces like the subway, the bus, schools, hospitals, or anywhere else you are, sars face mask , going to knowingly contact someone with an infection.
Anyone who wants additional information about the current outbreak of H1N1 flu (also called Swine Flu or Mexican Flu) can find it at the CDC webpage http://www.pandemicflu.gov. The CDC Hotline also maintains an 800-number to call with questions, (800-CDC-INFO) or you can e-mail questions to cdcinfo@cdc.gov.
In the United States, this data is collected and interpreted at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, also known as the CDC. The URL for the CDC home page is http://www.cdc.gov/. Anyone who wants additional information about Swine Flu, other diseases, or health conditions can follow the links on the CDC home page to much more detailed, in depth, and normally reliable information section of the home page containing links to the CDC.gov Top 10, a list of 10 threats to human health including disease, natural disasters, and illnesses caused by lifestyle choices.
The vital statistic information maintained at the state and county level is available to the CDC for its use and analysis. In that sense, it acts as a repository for information about illness and death throughout the United States. This data assists the CDC in determining norms and recognizing outbreaks, significant deviations from those norms.
**Barry E. Lewin, Esq. and Jason M. Wells, Esq. are attorneys in Phoenix, Arizona. They can be found at http://www.barrylewinlaw.com
