Definition and Characteristics of Communicable Diseases
Discuss about the Public Health for Emerging and Re-emerging Communicable Disease Threat.
Communicable diseases, which are also known as transmissible or infectious diseases, are the illnesses that are caused by the infection, growth and presence of the biologic agents that are pathogenic and cause diseases in either the animal host or in the individual human. Communicable diseases spread among the individuals by the ways of insect bites, breathing airborne viruses and contact with bodily fluids and blood (Abubakar, Rangaka and Lipman 2016). It is important that the communicable disease cases are essential for the evaluation and planning of control programs and disease prevention for the detection of the outbreaks from a common source and assurance of the appropriate medical therapy. It is expected that the communicable diseases threat might even get worse in future due to a number of risk factors that contributes to the ever-growing risk for the spread of the communicable diseases. Communicable diseases that are new are re-emerging poses a rising threat to global health that is expected to complicate the global security in future (Barron and Leung 2015). This will result in exacerbation of the political and social instability and will be identified as the leading cause of death. The communicable diseases spread mostly due to the human behavior changes that include land use patterns, lifestyles, inappropriate application of the antibiotics and increase travel and trade, all from the pathogen mutations (McCloskey et al. 2014). For centuries, the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable diseases have been ranked with the famine and wars and have been identified as a major challenge for the human survival and progress. Studying the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable diseases threat reveals the evolutionary characteristics of the pathogenic microorganisms and explains the relationship that is dynamic and exists between the hosts, environment and the microorganisms (Pal 2013). This assignment will, therefore, explore and review that discusses the emerging and re-emerging communicable disease threat and propose a possible way for its prevention.
Gummow (2010) conducted a research work that served to explain the reasons for the emergence and re-emergence of the threat of the communicable diseases in today’s world. The article compared the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable diseases with bioterrorism by identifying it as a constant threat that has made it a topical subject of research in recent times. The author argued that climate change and globalization has exerted a worldwide impact for the threat of the communicable diseases and has marked them as the primary driving forces for its emergence and re-emergence. This argument by the author has been well supported by the examination of the historical outbreaks of the diseases and the responsible factors for their emergence. This paper has also been very informative as it compared the historical outbreaks with the recent emerging diseases thus, highlighting the challenges that are faced by the livestock producers that inversely affects the human individuals. Several driving forces have been discussed by the author for the emerging and re-emerging of the communicable disease threat that includes translocation of people along with their livestock that result in the creation of a concurrent environment for the socio-economic upheaval and political unrest by invading people and armies. The other identified driving force by the author is the contact between the people, domestic animals and wild animals that involve the interaction between the naïve groups of population inducing the breakout of new diseases. However, the article was also informative in explaining the acceleration of the breakouts by stating that modern transport and trade mechanisms and modern farming practices are the responsible factors. The article concluded with the recommendation for the reduction of risks to prevent the emerging and re-emerging of the communicable disease threat in the modern human community.
Factors Contributing to Emerging and Re-emerging Communicable Disease Threat
Keeping in tune with the research topic, a similar research work was carried out by Gupta et al. (2012) which stated that the emergence of the communicable diseases and their basic causative factors present potential threat towards the worldwide stability of nations. It has been proclaimed by the authors that the responsible factors for the emergence and re-emergence are interrelated and complex. The identified factor by the author for the emergence and re-emergence is the widespread occurrence of antimicrobial resistance that is also a global issue of public health. Antimicrobial-resistant forms and new pathogens forms of the older pathogens are continuously emerging with the potential for global and rapid spread with high mortality and morbidity which are of immense importance to public health. The article has well explained the historical development of the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable diseases and also described its present status and the common causes. The authors have also discussed the platform created by World Health Organization for the provision of technical support to the all the participatory countries for the purpose of health development under the banner of International Health Regulation 2005. This is an instrument that is international and legally binding that has the purpose of controlling, protecting, preventing and providing responses of public health for prevention international spread of communicable diseases with the avoidance of the interference with the international trade and traffic. However, a gap has been identified in the article where emphasis was not provided on the future recommendations and they were only outlined without an appropriate explanation. To fulfill this gap, further literature will be critically appraised and recommendations will be provided to prevent the emerging and re-emerging of the communicable disease threat.
Further research has been carried out in this field to continue the argument by Zyga and Zografakis-Sfakianakis (2011) where emerging and re-emerging of the infectious diseases have been identified as a potential pandemic threat. The authors have argued that the field of communicable diseases is complex, vast and rapidly expanding and newer advances in the emergence of the novel communicable diseases, development of novel antimicrobial therapies and advances in the diagnostic testing require diligent study by the researchers. The researchers carried out a systematic review for exploring the possibilities of the emergence and re-emergence using the various professional and academic sources. It was found by the authors that international traveling can result in various health risks that are dependent on the characteristics of the travel and the traveler. Significant and sudden changes are encountered by the travelers due to changes in the temperature, microbes, humidity and altitude that cause ill health and the authors have further demonstrated that serious health risks can result out of the inadequate availability of clean water, underdeveloped medical services, inappropriate sanitation and hygiene and poor quality of accommodation. These factors affect the population in one part of the world which spreads to the other parts due to the concept of global village. The authors have well explained the fact that it requires only 36 hours to travel from one part of the world to another and this window of travel is enough for the incubation of the communicable diseases that causes their transmission by the travelers. This is a breakthrough and practical concept that have been well highlighted by the authors and it requires rapid response to the epidemics and greater emphasis on the communicable diseases wherever they emerge globally.
Scholarly Perspectives on Emergence and Re-emergence of Communicable Disease Threat
The argument has been viewed from a different perspective through the research work carried out by Dash et al. (2013) where the emerging and re-emerging of the communicable diseases have been investigated in the region of Southeast Asia. Arboviruses or Arthropod-borne viruses are a significant problem of public health that has increased the emergence and re-emergence of communicable diseases worldwide. The authors have listed several arboviral diseases that are uprising and are spreading unprecedentedly that result in considerable increase in the burden of diseases. The list contains the diseases like West Nile virus, Japanese encephalitis, dengue, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic and Kyasanur forest disease virus that causes their emergence and re-emergence and are associated with the complex factors like viral mutation and recombination. This leads to more adaptive and virulent strains, human activities and urbanization that creates more a permissive environment for the interaction of the vector and host due to increased commerce and air travel. The authors have very specifically identified the causative factors and their consequences which have made the paper more explanatory. The argument has been further continued by holding climate responsible for the determination of the temporal and geographic distribution of arthropods with the characteristics of the life cycles of the arthropods with their evolution and dispersal patterns. Considering these factors have been vital for designing the preventive framework from the arboviruses and the associated communicable diseases. The article has been very effective in recommending the priority actions for mitigation of the future and present arboviral threats and it includes improvement in the surveillance of the response to the outbreak. This is in accordance with the establishment of intersectional communication and collaboration and control, prevention and strengthening of the programs for the improvement of the biosafety aspects in regards to the highly communicable nature of these diseases.
Stramer (2014) explored the current perspectives that exist in the transfusion-transmitted communicable diseases to determine the emergence and non-emergence of the respective threats. The authors in this article presented their argument in a way that exhibited transfusion as a causative factor for the rise of the threat. The article identified sixty-eight agents that are responsible for the spread of the communicable diseases through transfusion transmission and warranted further consideration. The author raised his argument on a different perspective on the research topic to discover the threat of unsafe blood transfusion that leads to the development of communicable diseases and causes its emergence and re-emergence. It has been proposed by the author that every blood system should consider the development of the interventions for determining the blood safety from the EID agents. The article produced and reviewed examples for representing a wide variety of agents with diverse transmission routes, epidemiology and characteristics and the different risks have been discussed that leads to the different considerations while introducing an intervention. The process of tool-kit development and final product included methods for monitoring the emergence of EID agents, recognition and identification of the threat for transfusion-transmission, appropriate reduction of the associated risk and quantification of risk to the recipients of transfusion. The authors suggested that these should be considered for the process of implementation by all the systems of blood. This article was very much informative in the sense that a newer dimension was explored that accelerated the threat associated with the emergence and re-emergence of communicable diseases and possible recommendations have been provided to minimize the allied risk.
Global Public Health Implications of Emerging and Re-emerging Communicable Disease Threat
Butler (2012) carried out a focused literature review to investigate more on the topic and the article is more concerned about environment, infectious diseases and agriculture based on poverty and facilitated by the program for the tropical diseases. This article seemed to be an expansion of the continuing argument that explored a different angle of the threat of the communicable diseases. The author highlighted his concern that intensified the fact that the emergence of the communicable diseases and changes in the global environment will facilitate the generation of the major human pandemics in future. The article was diversified enough to analyze the ten categories of the communicable diseases that exist for emergence. The dominant concern for public health is mainly focused on two groupings that are informal. The author described the newly recognized infections as the most prominent factors for perceived threat caused y the virus originating from the developing countries in the rodents, bats and non-human primates. The identification of these vectors as the emerging carriers of the communicable diseases is novel information that this article carries and makes it credible for future research recommendations. Apart from these, the author also introduced several bird species to be closely related to the farmed pigs and chickens in the wet markets of Asia that are also responsible for the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable diseases threat. However, there has been an identified gap in the article as although it mentioned there is an insufficient understanding of the factors that are systemic for promoting pandemics, the author has not taken the initiative to explain most of them barring a few. This gap can be fulfilled from other research articles that are focused on a similar topic.
Parvez (2013) carried out a study to determine the controls and risks that are associated with the emerging and re-emerging of the viral diseases. The present world is overflowing with trades and travels due to globalization and the health of the human is under threat due to these communicable diseases. Like other articles appraised previously, this article has continued the argument by identifying the sources acting as novel pathogens for the humans that include farm poultry and mammals, arthropods and wild animals. The author extended the argument by estimating the fact that zoonosis is responsible for constituting about 60% and 75% for known and emerging factors respectively for the human infections. Several virus strains have been identified by the author that includes H1N1 and H5N1 that causes outbreaks, occasional pandemics and epidemics throughout the world. Understanding of the host-pathogen-environment relationship in the evolution of the microbes is the key for understanding the emergence and re-emergence of the novel pathogens. Although the article was very informative from the novel perspectives of human pathogens, there was a gap identified as insufficient data was available for the wild and domestic animals that are known to harbor several viral species. However, the author recommended that one stringent control measure is the product safety for consumable animals and protection of the human against the infections that are foodborne.
Another research work was conducted by Bunduki, Wafula and Bunduki (2016) for investigating the efficient control and dynamics for the emerging and re-emerging communicable diseases by exploring the past to the future. The article summarized few of the new and major viral infections for which the authors argued that the emergence of a virus that is completely new is an event that is extremely rare. Instead, it was proposed by the authors that the new viruses affecting human are always transmitted zoonotically from the animal species. This aspect has been well supported in the article by stating that mankind is confronted with the arrival of a new pathogen every year that is viral. However, some of them do not become self-sustaining human pathogenic infecting virus and remain below the threshold as either they are not responsible for causing human disease or they are not transmitted readily among the humans. This article has explored the trans-species transmissions of the new viruses due to expansion and growth of human population that brings the humans closer to the infectious agents and wild animals that have made the new viral infections man-made. The authors have expressed the classic control modalities like clinical virology and clinical medicine as essential and the efficient control measures and tools like remote sensing and mathematical modeling as important.
To shift the viewpoint of the problem statement and analyze it from a different angle, Okemo et al. (2013) carried out a research study to determine the intercession of the phytomedicine for countering the challenges of the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable disease threat. The authors have also nurtured the factor of pathogenic resistance to the antibiotics in their study and highlighted the accelerated rate with which the pathogens are presently developing resistance to the antibiotics which are currently in use. Emerging of the new maladies with the re-emerging of the old ones has been discussed by the authors where the role of the plants has been emphasized in tackling the challenges. This article has raised a new argument where the trend of the erratic use of antibiotics has developed newer challenges related to their respective regimen. Therefore, the authors have recommended that there is an urgency for the patient education on the usage of antibiotics and the emergence and re-emergence of the communicable disease threat can only be countered by phytomedicine.
A counter argument was raised by Vasavada (2014) for stating that not only livestock but food materials are equally responsible for the emerging and re-emerging of the threats of communicable diseases. The author in his article has explained this fact by stating that for the professionals of food safety, the topic has become a critical issue and the author has addressed the focus of the consumer on public health. It has been stated that a single microbe cannot be associated with the creation of a pathogen that is mosaic hybrid or with the food and therefore, the pathogens have been grouped collectively in the unspecified etiology category. Since the zoonotic sources are heavily responsible for the emerging infectious diseases, therefore, the author has help responsible the global food supply as the in vivo source of the generation of novel pathogens and disease-causing organisms. Food safety issues can have remarkable impacts on its various aspects pertaining to the food industry, policy and regulations and to counter this unfavorable situation, the author has recommended that it is the need of the moment to acquire data for translating the biological hazards and transferring it from an unknown entity to a known origin.
From the reviewed literature, it is evident that promoting and strengthening the applied and basic research on the environment factors, hosts and pathogens by the usage of knowledge on the environment interactions, hosts and pathogens will enhance the ability for prevention and prediction of the conditions that led to the development of human diseases and are essential. Tracking of the strategies for better control and development of the international and national scientific expertise is required for responding to the threats to the future health with the support of training and research programs and also crucial (Kawamoto and Bari 2015). Intervention of the post-genomic researches, sequencing and therapies, vaccines and newer diagnostics for the emerging agents of infectious diseases along with the animal vectors for revealing the genetic basis for the pathogenicity, adaptation and vector or microbial evolution is the next step in the prevention of the threat (Funk et al. 2013). More emphasis has to be provided on the improved systems of public health, better diagnostic facilities, research and training with surveillance for reporting of the communicable diseases at the time of its emergence for prevention of pandemics.
References
Abubakar, I., Rangaka, M.X. and Lipman, M., 2016. Investigating emerging infectious diseases. Infectious Disease Epidemiology, p.87.
Barron, M.A. and Leung, D.Y., 2015. Lessons from Ebola and readiness for new emerging infectious threats. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology,135(4), p.872.
Bunduki, G.K., Wafula, M. and Bunduki, G.K., 2016. Emerging Viral Diseases: From the past to the future for an efficient dynamics and control.
Butler, C.D., 2012. Infectious disease emergence and global change: thinking systemically in a shrinking world. Infectious Diseases of Poverty,1(1), p.1.
Dash, A.P., Bhatia, R., Sunyoto, T. and Mourya, D.T., 2013. Emerging and re-emerging arboviral diseases in Southeast Asia. J Vector Borne Dis, 50(2), pp.77-84.
Funk, S., Bogich, T.L., Jones, K.E., Kilpatrick, A.M. and Daszak, P., 2013. Quantifying trends in disease impact to produce a consistent and reproducible definition of an emerging infectious disease. PloS one, 8(8), p.e69951.
Gummow, B., 2010. Challenges posed by new and re-emerging infectious diseases in livestock production, wildlife and humans. Livestock Science,130(1), pp.41-46.
Gupta, S.K., Gupta, P., Sharma, P., Shrivastava, A.K. and Soni, S.K., 2012. Emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, future challenges and strategy. J Clin Diagn Res, 6(6), pp.1095-100.
Kawamoto, S. and Bari, M.L., 2015. Emerging and Re-emerging Foodborne Diseases: Threats to Human Health and Global Stability. Foodborne Pathogens and Food Safety, p.97.
McCloskey, B., Dar, O., Zumla, A. and Heymann, D.L., 2014. Emerging infectious diseases and pandemic potential: status quo and reducing risk of global spread. The Lancet Infectious Diseases, 14(10), pp.1001-1010.
Okemo, P.O., Machocho, A.K., Omari, A., Mbugua, P.K., Njagi, E.N.M. and Nyamache, A.K., 2013. Intercession of Phytomedicine in the Challenges of Emerging, Re-Emerging Diseases; and Pathogens Resistance to Antibiotics.
Pal, M., 2013. Public health concern due to emerging and re-emerging zoonoses. International Journal of Livestock Research, 3(1), pp.56-62.
Parvez, M.K., 2013. Emerging and re-emerging viral diseases: risks and controls. Microbial Pathogens and Strategies for Combating Them: Science, Technology and Education, Ed. by A. Mendez-Vila, pp.1619-1626.
Stramer, S.L., 2014. Current perspectives in transfusion?transmitted infectious diseases: emerging and re?emerging infections. ISBT science series, 9(1), pp.30-36.
Vasavada, P., 2014. Emerging, Re-emerging and Opportunistic Foodborne Pathogens: Bugs You Don’t Know May Bug You!. In 2014 Annual Meeting. Iafp.
Zyga, S. and Zografakis-Sfakianakis, M. 2011, “Emerging and re-Emerging Infectious Diseases: A potential pandemic threat”, Health Science Journal, vol. 5, no. 3, pp. 159.
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