The CDC contains information on diseases including epidemiological data such as

Question

The CDC contains information on diseases including epidemiological data such as prevalence, incidence, and mortality rate of the disease. Define each of these terms and explain why it may be important to know about each of these data points. Then, look up the prevalence, incidence, and mortality rates of hanta virus, the flu, and HIV/AIDS in the United States. Then compare these data points between these diseases and explain what this means (Which one is scarier? Which one takes more lives? Which one would you more likely die from?). This answer should be AT MINIMUM 15 sentences long Cite your sources.

Explanation / Answer

Epidemiology is referred to as the study and analysis of the patterns, causes, and effects of health and disease conditions in defined populations.

Incidence-

Incidence refers to the rate of new cases of the disease. It is generally reported as the number of new cases occurring within a period of time (e.g., per month, per year). When the incidence rate is reported as a fraction of the population at risk of developing the disease, incidence rates make more sense. How true an incidence data is, depends on the accuracy of diagnosis and reporting of the disease. Incidence rates may also include incidence of disease in gender, age groups, origin etc.

Prevalence-

When actual number of cases, who are alive, are noted it becomes the prevalence rate. It can be of two types- Period prevalence- cases with the disease during a particular period of time and Point prevalence- number of cases at a particular date in time. Period prevalence is considered to be a better measure of the disease load because it includes all new cases and all deaths between two any dates, whereas point prevalence only counts those alive on a particular date.

Mortality-

A mortality rate is the number of deaths due to a disease divided by the total population. For example, if there are 25 cancer deaths in one year in a population of 30,000, then the mortality rate for that population is 83 per 100,000.

Hantavirus-

As of January 2017, a total of 728 cases of Hantavirus Infection have been reported in the United States. The mortality rate is 36%. Of persons ill with HPS, 63% have been male, 37% female. Hantavirus Infection can strike anyone. However, Whites currently account for 78% of all cases. American Indians account for about 18% of cases. African Americans for 1% of cases, and Asians for 1% of cases. Of cases with known ethnicity, 19% of Hantavirus cases have been reported among Hispanics (ethnicity considered separately from race).

Source- https://www.cdc.gov/hantavirus/surveillance/index.html

Flu- Incidence rate of flu is approximately 1 in 3 or 36%, prevalence is 10 to 20% and mortality rate is 0.1 individual per 100,000 population

HIV/AIDS- .4 to .9 is prevalence and mortality rate is 2:1 in USA.

The comparative analysis shows that one is more likely to die of HIV/AIDS.

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