Emerging infectious disease.html |
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Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (January 2007) |
An emerging infectious disease (EID) is an infectious disease whose incidence has increased in the past 20 years and threatens to increase in the near future. EIDs include diseases caused by a newly identified microorganism or newly identified strain of a known microorganism (e.g. SARS, AIDS);[1] new infections resulting from change or evolution of an existing organism (e.g. influenza), a known infection which spreads to a new geographic area or population (e.g. West Nile virus), newly recognized infection in an area undergoing ecologic transformation (e.g. Lyme disease), and pre-existing and recognized infections reemerging due to drug resistance of their agent or to a breakdown in public health (e.g. tuberculosis).
The U.S. journal Emerging Infectious Diseases is dedicated to EIDs.
Mechanisms of emergence and reemergence
- Microbial adaption; e.g. genetic drift and genetic shift in Influenza A
- Changing human susceptibility; e.g. mass immunocompromisation with HIV/AIDS
- Climate and weather; e.g. diseases with zoonotic vectors such as West Nile Disease (transmitted by mosquitoes) are moving further from the tropics as the climate warms
- Change in human demographics and trade; e.g. rapid travel enabled SARS to rapidly propagate around the globe
- Economic development; e.g. use of antibiotics to increase meat yield of farmed cows leads to antibiotic resistance
- Breakdown of public health; e.g. the current situation in Zimbabwe
- Poverty and social inequality; e.g. tuberculosis is primarily a problem in low-income areas
- War and famine
- Bioterrorism; e.g. 2001 Anthrax attacks
- Dam and irrigation system construction; e.g. malaria and other mosquito borne diseases
References
- Laegreid, W.W.,Impacts of Emerging Infectious Disease Research on International Security Policy, ACDIS International Security Policy Brief no. 1 (April 2008), Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security (ACDIS) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
- ^ Fauci AS (2005). "Emerging and reemerging infectious diseases: the perpetual challenge". Academic medicine : journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges 80 (12): 1079–85. PMID 16306276.
- Lashley FR (2004). "Emerging infectious diseases: vulnerabilities, contributing factors and approaches". Expert review of anti-infective therapy 2 (2): 299–316. PMID 15482195.