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Epidemiology, Disease Transmission, Prevention, and Control
Published in Julius P. Kreier, Infection, Resistance, and Immunity, 2022
Any deviation of the health status of an individual, human, or animal from normal may be considered a disease. Those diseases that occur at a usual, continuous, persistent low level in a human or animal population in a given geographical area are called endemic or enzootic diseases, respectively. A sudden increase in the number of cases of a disease above its expected incidence is called an epidemic, or an epizootic if in an animal population. Epizootiology is the name sometimes used to describe patterns of disease spread in nonhuman animal populations. A gradual increase in the occurrence of a disease beyond the endemic level, but still not of epidemic proportion is called hyperendemic. When an epidemic affects an extremely high number of individuals distributed worldwide, it is called a pandemic. A similar situation occurring in an animal population is called a panzootic.
Skin, soft tissue and bone infections
Published in Miriam Orcutt, Clare Shortall, Sarah Walpole, Aula Abbara, Sylvia Garry, Rita Issa, Alimuddin Zumla, Ibrahim Abubakar, Handbook of Refugee Health, 2021
Interrupt transmission by treating all of the household contacts, and wash all clothes worn <24 hours before or during treatment. Treat staff if they have prolonged skin-to-skin contact. Initiate infection control measures – for example contact precautions and hand-washing. Studies have shown mass drug administration on a population level to be effective in hyperendemic areas. Contact items, for example towels and clothes, can either be put in a plastic bag for at least 3 days or washed in hot water, ironed or placed in a hot drier. Education of local healthcare staff and patients is important.
Geography on Onchocerciasis Blindness in Northern Cameroon
Published in Max J. Miller, E. J. Love, Parasitic Diseases: Treatment and Control, 2020
The highest prevalence of the disease is observed on the upper Mayo Rey River, and its tributary, the Mayo Diddi. This focus is located near the frontier with Chad, into which it must extend, although no medical surveys have been conducted. In 1981, a survey of 1400 inhabitants established a prevalence of 54.5% and a rate of blindness of 3.9%. The prevalence among children under 15 years of age was 33.2%. Our data indicate that 43% of the population live in hyperendemic areas. Between 1957 — 1982, the incidence of blindness was 3.5 per 1000. Ranking highest in severity, we must cite the numerous small foci along the tributaries of the left bank of the Benoue River (Mayo Alim, Mayo Wali Konga, Mayo Sala, Mayo Boki) never before surveyed. Our data indicate a rate of blindness of 4.1% in Gouna (population 501), the largest village in the area. We found a rate of blindness of 5.5% in the canton of Panon Pope (population, 778) and 5.7% in the canton of Pintchoumba (population, 370). We also can say that 35% of the population is living in hyperendemic villages and 78% in hyper- and mesoendemic villages. Another subfocus is located in the middle of the region near the Mayo Rey and Benoue Rivers. In 1981, the prevalence of onchocerciasis was 54.5% in three villages (population, 726). The percentage of people living in hyperendemic areas is 23% and in hyper- and mesoendemic areas, 95%. It is in this subfocus that the percentage of people living in hypoendemic villages is lowest.
Leprosy: why does it persist among us?
Published in Expert Review of Anti-infective Therapy, 2020
Victor S. Santos, Carlos D. F. de Souza, Paulo R. S. Martins-Filho, Luis E. Cuevas
The 2016–2020 Strategy also highlights the need for strengthening active case finding, particularly targeting leprosy foci in hyperendemic areas, to identify and treat early other cases occurring within the household, potentially reducing its spread and decreasing disability through the detection of less severe cases. Several leprosy control programs have implemented active case finding through mass campaigns and screen household contacts. Household contacts are at a higher risk of leprosy than the general population and active screening has a higher yield than passive case finding – when patients notice symptoms and seek health care services. Contact tracing has similar performance identifying cases in hyperendemic and low endemic areas and may also result in an earlier diagnosis, with the detection of cases with less disease severity [10]. Despite its higher yield, contact tracing requires a skilled clinical dermato-neurological examination, which depends on the health worker ability and training and simpler methods that are less operator dependent are needed. Serological and other laboratory tests have been developed to supplement a clinical diagnosis, but they have either a low diagnostic accuracy, especially for PB leprosy, or have limitations for implementation in primary health care facilities with limited laboratory infrastructure [10,11].
Dengue: a growing threat requiring vaccine development for disease prevention
Published in Pathogens and Global Health, 2018
Sandra Bos, Gilles Gadea, Philippe Despres
According to the WHO, the actual numbers of dengue cases are underreported and 3.9 billion people, representing half of the global population, are estimated at risk of infection [3]. One recent estimate indicates 390 million dengue infections per year (95% credible interval 284–528 million) instead of the 50 to 100 million cases usually quoted, of which 96 million (67–136 million) manifest clinically, independently of the severity of disease [4]. The geographic range of DENV widely spread from tropical to most subtropical regions where endemicity was facilitated by the abundance of vectors and high population density. Most hyperendemic regions are located in Asia and Latin America, with a particular focus towards Thailand, Philippines, India and Brazil which experienced the highest number of severe outbreaks in the last decades [2]. In recent years, outbreak reports and meta-analysis raised up changes in epidemiological trends of the disease (Figure 1).
Management of meningococcal outbreaks: are we using the same language? Comparison of the public health policies between high-income countries with low incidence of meningococcal disease
Published in Expert Review of Vaccines, 2019
Tea Burmaz, Stefano Guicciardi, Vittorio Selle, Pier Luigi Lopalco, Vincenzo Baldo, Maria Pia Fantini
Hyperendemic or persistently elevated IMD rates in the community are identified as the occurrence of IMD cases of the same serogroup at rates above the expected level of disease in a given population. These cases can be sporadic or related to organization-based outbreaks and continue to occur despite the institution of local public health control measures. Canadian policy does not provide a precise time frame for defining persistently elevated IMD rates, while French policy indicates that hyperendemic IMD rates may last a year. In providing an example of hyperendemic MenB, the French policy describes a crude incidence rate of 3/100,000 with at least four cases related to identical or non-differentiable strains in the last 52 weeks or less [26,34].