Micropara 4: Capabilities of Pathogen Flashcards
is the capacity of a pathogen to produce disease
Pathogenicity
seven capabilities of a pathogen
- Maintain a reservoir
- Leave its reservoir and enter a host-transmission
- Adhering to a body surface
- Invade the body
- Evade the body’s defense mechanisms
- Multiply within the body
- Leave the body and return to its reservoir or enter a new host
A place to live before and after infection and is most common
Maintain a reservoir
reservoirs examples
- humans
- animals
- environment (nonliving: soil & water)
examples of human reservoirs
- Diseased
- Carriers
- Virus: smallpox
- Bacterium: gonorrhea, typhoid fever, strep throat
examples of animal reservoirs
- Zoonosis
- Virus
- Bacterium
- Fungus
- Protozoa
a human disease caused by a pathogen with an animal reservoir
Zoonosis
Virus reservoirs
- Rocky Mt. spotted fever
- rabies
- yellow fever
Bacterium reservoirs
- Lyme disease
- plague (Yersinia pestis)
Environmental (non-living) Reservoir examples
Soil, water
Tetanus
Legionnaire’s Disease
Water contaminated with feces
spores live in soil
Tetanus
legionnaire’s disease
water, often in air conditioning ductwork
Water contaminated with feces
- cholera
- typhoid fever
how the pathogen leaves the reservoir and gets to the host
Modes of transmission
Modes of transmission
- respiratory droplets
- fomites (objects)
- Direct contact (touching, kissing, sex)
- Also called person-to-person
- fecal-oral
- Vectors
- Mechanical
- Biological
- airborne
- parenteral (
most common mode of transmission
respiratory droplets
objects mode of transmission
fomites
touching, kissing, sex
Direct contact a.k.a. person-to-person
this mode of transmission examples are ticks, mosquitoes, fleas
Vectors
this mode of transmission can survive drying, ex. TB
airborne
mode of transmission directly into blood
parenteral
the site at which a pathogen enters
Portal of Entry
Portal of Entries of a Pathogen
- Skin
- Mucous membranes of resp tract, GI, and GU
- Respiratory tract (lungs) is easiest
- bloodstream
- placenta
Likelihood of infection (2 types)
- Infectious Dose (ID 50)
- Lethal Dose (LD 50)