apes chapter 17

Disease

Any impaired function of the body with a characteristic set of symptoms.

Infectious Disease

A disease caused by a pathogen.

Chronic Disease

A disease that slowly impairs functioning of an organism.

Acute Disease

A disease that rapidly impairs the functioning of an organism.

Epidemic

A situation in which a pathogen causes a rapid increase in disease.

Plague

An infectious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, carried by fleas.

Malaria

An infectious disease caused by one of several species of protists in the genus Plasmodium.

Tuberculosis

A highly contagious disease caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis that primarily infects the lungs.

HIV

A virus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

AIDS

An infectious disease caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever

An infectious disease with high death rates, caused by the Ebola virus.

Mad Cow Disease

A disease in which prions mutate into deadly pathogens and slowly damage a cow's nervous system.

Bird Flu

also called avian influenza, it is a viral disease carried by birds; this virus spreads by water, air and soil; it is dangerous to humans because our immune system does not have antibodies that can beat this virus

West Nile Virus

A mosquito-born virus that causes West Nile fever.

Emergent Disease

An infectious disease that has not been previously described or has not been common for at least 20 years.

Toxicology

study of poisonous substances and their effects upon body parts

Neurotoxin

A poison that attacks the nervous system, causing blindness, paralysis, or suffocation

Carcinogen

Chemicals that cause cancer.

Mutagen

Carcinogens that cause damage to the genetic material of a cell.

Teratogen

Chemicals that interfere with the normal development of embryos or fetuses.

Allergen

A chemical that causes allergic reactions.

Endocrine Disruptor

Chemicals that interfere with normal functioning of hormones in an animal's body

Dose-Response Study

A study that exposes organisms to difierent amounts of a chemical and then observes a variety of possible responses, including mortality or changes in behavior or reproduction.

Acute Study

An experiment that exposes organisms to an environmental hazard for a short duration.

LD50

A chemical dose lethal to 50 percent of a test population

ED50

An abbreviation for the effective dose of a chemical that causes 50 percent of the individuals in a dose-response study to display a harmful, but nonlethal, effect.

Chronic Study

An experiment that exposes organisms to an environmental hazard for a long duration.

Retrospective Study

A study that monitors people who have been exposed to an environmental hazard at some time in the past.

Prospective Study

A study that monitors people who might become exposed to harmful chemicals in the future.

Synergistic Interaction

Risks that cause more harm together than expected based on separate individual risks.

Biomagnification

the increase in a chemical concentration in animal tissues as the chemical moves up the food chain

Persistence

The length of time a chemical remains in the environment.

Risk Assessment

Determining the damage that would result from an attack and the likelihood that the vulnerability is a risk to the organization.

Risk Management

A strategy developed to reduce or control the chance of harm or loss to one's health or life; the process of identifying, evaluating, selecting and implementing actions to reduce risk to human health and to ecosystems

Precautionary Principle

A guiding principle in making decisions about the environment, cautioning to consider carefully the potential consequences of actions

Stockholm Convention

A 2001 agreement among 127 nations concerning 12 chemicals to be banned, phased out, or reduced.