What Are The Odds? Trivia Quiz

Answer: How quickly a disease can spread through a population

More specifically the basic reproduction number is the number of people, on average, a single infected individual infects. This value is important because it gives the epidemiologist a vague idea of how quickly a disease will spread though a population.

The higher the value, the more contagious the disease, and the harder it is to control an outbreak. This value is usually given as a range because the value is partially dependent upon the susceptibility of the population.

Answer: Measles

Measles has an estimated basic reproduction number of 12-18. This is extremely high when compared to Influenza (depending on the strain) which only has an average basic reproduction number of 2-3 (HIV is about the same). Ebola has an even lower estimated value of 1.5-2.5. According to this information, an outbreak of the measles would spread much more quickly than an outbreak of the flu. Measles is so contagious because the virus hijacks immune cells to spread beyond the initial site of infection (the lungs) to the trachea, while many other respiratory viruses stay in the lung tissue.

As soon as a person with measles coughs, enormous amounts of viral particles are released into the air, and these particles can live outside the host for upwards of 2 hours.

Answer: Prevalence

One of the first things an epidemiologist learns is the difference between Incidence and Prevalence. Prevalence tells us how many people have the disease in a population while incidence is a measure of probability for a disease over a specific period of time. For example it could tell us how many new cases of a diseases there are per year.

Answer: False

An epidemiologist can study any type of disease. This includes chronic disease, vector-borne disease, mental disease, autoimmune disease, cancer and many others. Some epidemiologists even look at the rate of injury in populations. Certain aspects of health can also impact disease in a relationship an epidemiologist calls a syndemic.

For example, syndemic relationships are common between acute and chronic disease. Being a carrier for some viruses can increase the risk of certain cancers and autoimmune conditions.

Answer: It is regularly found in a group of people or in a certain region

An epidemic is a level of disease beyond what is normal (rapid spread). A disease can be endemic to a region or group of people without ever reaching epidemic levels. In fact, a disease will wreak much more havoc and spread more quickly in populations which have never been exposed to the disease.

Answer: The time between exposure and the onset of symptoms

It is important to know the incubation period of a disease when trying to prevent an outbreak. Anyone who may have been exposed to Ebola, for example, would need to be isolated for at least 21 days. If they have not shown symptoms after this period of time, this person was either not infected or their immune symptom fought off the disease without them ever becoming symptomatic. If they do show symptoms, they would need to be isolated until they recovered.

Some diseases have a much longer incubation period than others.

This is not to be confused with the infectious period or the length of time an infected individual is contagious. Often times an infected person can spread a disease before symptoms appear.

Answer: Family History

An intrinsic determinant is directly related to the physiological characteristics of the host or the pathogen while extrinsic determinants are attributed to some sort of external influence in the environment. Understanding all of the determinants of a disease is one of the first steps in an epidemiological study. Often, these determinants are much more complex than it would seem.

They include a mix of biological, environmental, social, cultural and economic variables. Family history, an observation of genetic predisposition, would be considered an intrinsic, biological determinant.

Answer: All of these answers are correct

Diseases are constantly emerging and reemerging. Pathogens evolve quickly, with factors such as antibiotic resistance and the anti-vaccination movement leading to more virulent strains of diseases we once thought were on the way out. New diseases and bio terrorism are also always a threat especially with the increase of global communication and development.

It may have seemed as though the odds were in our favor when it came to eradicating infectious disease, but the pathogens are fighting back and evolving methods to resist our current defenses at the exact same time in which we are undergoing a period of rapid globalization.

Answer: Agent, host and environment

The agent refers to the pathogen or toxin responsible for a disease. The host is whoever is harboring the causative agent and the environment is what brings the agent and the host together. The epidemiological triad is a model used for studying all types of health problems, particularly infectious diseases. Together they form a triangle (all 3 are connected) and the goal is to break one of the connections in the triangle to stop the spread of the disease. Too often we think about one point of the triangle when we really need to focus on the relationships between the different vertices (angles).

Answer: Public health focuses on populations, rather than individuals

The academic discipline of public health seeks to improve the health of the world while a doctor works on a patient by patient basis. This is not to say medicine is less important (we can't live without it), but treating symptoms will only take us so far. Public health informs medical practice.

Naturally, prevention is a big part of public health, but public health is about much more than a simple reminder to wash our hands or to eat our fruits and vegetables. It analyzes all of the complexities surrounding our health and susceptibility to disease from a population perspective.