Infectious Diseases Flashcards
What’s a pathogen and what are the 3 types
Pathogens a microbe which causes disease. 3 types are:
- Bacteria
- viruses
- fungi
How does a vaccination work
Dead or inactive pathogen injected in body. White blood cells make antibodies to kill them
What’s antibodies and how they fight injections
Antibodies produced by white blood cells. They clump together pathogens so they can next time recognise them and fight them quicker
What are antibiotics used to treat and an example
Used to treat bacterial infections by killing bacteria in the body they can not kill viruses as they are inside cells and example is penicillin
What is immunity
You cannot catch a disease
How bacteria make u ill
Reproduce rapidly in body and produce toxins making us feel ill
How you become immune to disease
Catch the disease and have vaccinations
What does MMR protect us against
Measles Mumps and Rubella
What is epidemic
What is pandemic
Epidemic-disease spread around local area
Pandemic-disease spread around world
How do bacteria and virus make us ill
Bacteria and virus may reproduce rapidly inside the body and may produce poisons (toxins) that make us ill. Viruses damage cells they reproduce in (they burst)
How the immune system works
Produces specific antibodies to kill particular pathogen. Leads to immunity from pathogen. Dead or inactive pathogens stimulate antibody production.
What is Semmelweis conclusion
He recognised the importance of hand washing in prevention of spreading infectious diseases. By insisting that doctors washed their hands before examining patients he greatly reduced number of deaths from infectious diseases in hospitals
What’s the function of painkillers
Relieve symptoms of infectious diseases but do not kill pathogens
What’s is MRSA
A strain of bacteria that has developed resistance to antibiotics as a result of natural selection. To avoid further resistance we need to stop over use of antibiotics
How will a pathogen become resistant to an antibiotic
By mutation as pathogens produce new strains. So antibiotics and vaccinations are no longer effective. The new strain increase rapidly as there is no effective treatment
Work of antibiotics
Antibiotics kills individual pathogens of the non resistant strains. Individual resistant strains survive and reproduce, so population of resistant strain increases. Now antibiotics are used to treat sore throat so rare it development of resistant strains slow down
How would you sterilise Petri dishes and culture media
They must be sterilised before use to kill unwanted microorganisms. Inoculating loops used to transfer microorganisms to media must be sterilised by passing them through flame to kill microorganisms. Lid of Petri dish should he secured with tape to prevent microorganisms from the air contaminating the culture
What’s the temperature cultures should be incubated at schools
Max temperature of 25 degrees which reduces growth of pathogens that might be harmful to humans
