Viruses & Bacteria

Viruses & Bacteria By the Cosmos Team: Jackie, Carol, Norma, Francisco

Objective • To inform the audience with helpful information from the readings in order to make a connection to the quantitative assignment. • Explain main points so that the audience leaves with an understanding of the material.

Outcome • Audience will be able to connect key points to their current assignment. • The readings will be summarized and comprehended to a certain amount.

Robbins- The Ecology of Disease • Ecosystems: many ways nature supports the human endeavor • Most epidemics such as AIDS, Ebola, West Nile, SARS, Lyme disease don’t just happen. • Diseases occur because of what we do to nature. • Experts try to figure out how people alter the landscape in order to find out where the next diseases are likely to spill over into humans. • Experts do this in order to spot them when they emerge before they spread. • Ecological diseases are a public health issue but also an economic one. • For example, a severe influenza pandemic could cost the world economy $3 trillion.

Robbins Continue • More than two million people are killed by diseases that spread to humans from wild and domestic animals. • The Nipah virus in South Asia and the Hendra virus in Australia • Zoonotic outbreaks are causing ecological diseases. • “Any emerging disease in the last 30 or 40 years has come about as a result of encroachment into wild lands and changes in demography. “ • AIDS emerged from chimpanzees in the 1920s when bush-meat hunters in Africa killed and butchered them. • Diseases have always come out of the woods and wildlife and found their way into human populations.

Robbins Continue • It is important to understand “protective effects” of nature in order to spot and prevent the next pandemic. • Lyme disease is a product of human changes to the environment: the reduction and fragmentation of large contiguous forests. • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQit9TG1WBo • Best way to prevent the next outbreak in humans is to study human, animal, and ecological health. • Find out what is that drives the emergence of a disease so you can know how to modify the environment. • EcoHealth researchers will go to places where there are new things getting built and tell them that what they are doing could be harmful for their helath.

Robbins Continue • EcoHealth also scans luggage and packages at airports, looking for imported wildlife likely to be carrying deadly viruses. • Key Concept: Now there is a coordinated effort in 20 countries to develop an early warning system for emerging zoonotic outbreaks.

Brehm - Controlling Contagion by Restricting Mobility

Zimmer- Looking Down from the Stars • Influenza: also known as “the flu.” Infectious disease of birds. • Medieval Physicians believed that stars influenced the health of their patients. • Most flu cases happen during the winter . -In the U.S about 36 thousand people die of Influenza • People can catch a virus through coughs, sneezes, and runny noses. • The Influenza virus remains surprisingly mysterious • Seasonal flu is most dangerous for people with weak immune systems (mostly young children& elderly) • Flu pandemics: people w/ strong immune systems proved to be vulnerable • The virus came from birds- Birds carry all the known strains of human influenza viruses. • Swine flu- jumped from pigs to humans. It started in Mexico and soon spread over the entire planet.

Contd. • Tip: - We can do things to slow the spread of the flu, such as washing our hands.

Zimmer- Germ Warfare: Antiviral Drugs Could Blast the Common Cold- Should We Use Them? • Bacterium: a member of a large group of unicellular microorganisms that have cell walls but lack organelles and an organized nucleus, including some that can cause disease.

Zimmer Continue • Virus: an infective agent that typically consists of a nucleic acid molecule in a protein coat, is too small to be seen by light microscopy, and is able to multiply only within the living cells of a host….ex. "a virus infection" • an infection or disease caused by a virus. • a piece of code that is capable of copying itself and typically has a detrimental effect, such as corrupting the system or destroying data.

Zimmer Continue • 1928 Alexander Fleming, a microbiologist, noticed a speck of mold in one of his cultures of Staphylococcus bacteria. It was spreading and killing the bacteria surrounding it. • Though this event Fleming discovered that the mold could kill other infectious bacteria as well. • Penicillin: An antibiotic or group of antibiotics produced naturally by certain blue molds, and now usually prepared synthetically. • Penicillin has helped the fight against bacteria

Zimmer Continue • A virus is different from a bacteria. • There are “antiviral” drugs but they do not work alone (therefore they are taken as a “cocktail”) • If one stops taking the cocktail/ medicine the virus will return to its former level in weeks • Ways to try and stop/ cure a virus • Try and mess with the outer wall od the cells • Proteins • New forms of medication • Studying RNA • The Problem is Resistance

Video • Summarize the movie “I Am Legend” • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRctxZT-a1A • What did you hear from the video that really caught your attention?

Heller- Syphilis Victims in Us Study Went Untreated for 40 Years • Syphilis is a highly contagious sexually transmitted decease (STD). • The Tuskegee Experiment: was an experiment in which 600 black men(400 infected, 200 were not) were used as guinea pigs to try and find a cure of syphilis. In the experiment only some of the volunteers were given the treatment while others were not. It was believed that this disease was in your head and it would be cured if you thought you were getting it treated while you really were not. As a result there many casualties in the program and it was a “Moral Nightmare”.

Syphilis Video • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8K-nxe0m0LA

Reflective Activity • If you had the opportunity to cure HIV without getting paid, would you do it? • Why or why not?

Viruses & Bacteria