Lecture 10: Driver Final

Question 1

List the following for the Black Death:
1. Killed what fraction of Europe’s population?
2. How did it arrive in Italy?
3. Where is the plague believed to have originated from?

Answer 1

1. 1/3
2. Via ships carrying flea-laden rats from Crimea in October 1347
3. Believed to have originated in Central Asia possibly China

Question 2

How does international trade and travel act as a driver of emerging infectious diseases?

Answer 2

Introduce pathogens into a new geographic area
- Infected people/animals/plants
- Vectors
- Contaminated materials/water/food

Question 3

1. What is Aedes albopictus?
2. What diseases can it transmit?
3. Where did it originate from?
4. How was it introduced to the US?
5. When did it arrive in Los Angeles?

Answer 3

1. Asian tiger mosquito
   - Aggressive biter
   - Survives in both forest and suburban habitats
2. Dengue, eastern equine encephalitis, La Crosse, yellow fever, other viruses and parasites
3. Tropical forestes of SE Asia
4. Introduced in the mid1980s through a shipment of scrap tires from northern Asia
5. 2011

Question 4

What factors cause public health programs to fail?

Answer 4

• Termination or neglect of program
• Lack of funding
• Drop in public support and compliance
• Lack of regulations or oversight
• War or disasters

Question 5

List the following for Cryptosporidium parvum:
1. What is it?
2. Reservoir
3. Transmission
4. What is the infective stage?

Answer 5

1. Protozoan parasite
2. Various animals and humans
3. Fecal-oral, waterborne, food borne
4. Oocyst is the infective stage

Question 6

Explain what happened during the 1992 Milwaukee cryptosporidosis outbreak?

Answer 6

• Largest waterborne disease outbreak documented in the US
• Occurred in the spring of 1993
• 400,000+ people sick, 4,000 hospitalized, 104 deaths
• Nonfunctioning water filtration plant led to residents drinking water contaminate with Cryptosporidium parvum oocysts

Question 7

It is believed that about what fraction of infectious diseases can be aggravated by climate change?

Answer 7

About half

Question 8

How does climate change contribute to emerging infectious diseases?

Answer 8

1. Warmer climates are expanding the areas where vectors can live and microbes can spread
2. Rainfall, floods and even drought lead to stagnant water for vectors to breed
   - Can also create unsanitary conditions as water can be contaminated by runoff
3. Extreme weather events or natural disasters disrupt infrastructure and public health systems
4. Changes in the seasonal pattern of diseases
5. Can contribute to the migration of people