Especialidades JA/Virus/Respuestas

Virus
Asociación General Salud y ciencia	Destreza: 2 Año de introducción: 2012

Requisitos

1

Describir o discutir el siguiente con un grupo. Si es necesario, investigar posibles respuestas a estos temas para poder hacer contribuciones significativas al grupo.

1a

¿Qué significa la palabra virus? Explicar la controversia sobre si se trata de un ser vivo o no.

1b

Nombrar las características distintivas de los virus y por qué no están incluidos en ningún reino.

1c

Nombrar algunas formas morfológicas de los virus y dar un ejemplo de cada una.

1d

Explicar la importancia de las vacunas para combatir los virus. ¿Cómo funcionan?

1e

Describir cómo los virus reproducen y cómo ocurren las modificaciones genéticas llamadas mutaciones y la resistencia viral.

1f

¿Se han erradicado enfermedades virales? ¿Por qué es tan difícil tratar a los pacientes con enfermedades virales?

2

Por medio de imágenes, video o descripciones detalladas, explicar las diferencias de las siguientes enfermedades exantemáticas o eruptivas:

2a

Rubéola

2b

Sarampión

2c

Varicela

3

Escoger tres de las siguientes enfermedades virales y describir la forma de contagio, síntomas y prevención. Demostrar su aprendizaje de manera creativa por medio de una exhibición, presentación o discurso preparado:

3a

COVID-19

3b

Zika

3c

Ébola

3d

Nilo Occidental

3e

Mano-pie-boca (aftosa humana)

3f

Herpes

3g

SIDA

3h

Papera

With more than one-third of the world’s population living in areas at risk for infection, dengue virus is a leading cause of illness and death in the tropics and subtropics. As many as 400 million people are infected yearly. Dengue is caused by any one of four related viruses transmitted by mosquitoes. There are not yet any vaccines to prevent infection with dengue virus and the most effective protective measures are those that avoid mosquito bites. When infected, early recognition and prompt supportive treatment can substantially lower the risk of medical complications and death. http://www.cdc.gov/dengue/

4

Explicar las diferencias entre la gripe y el resfriado. ¿Por qué el virus de la influenza causa epidemias periódicas (como la gripe española, gripe aviar, gripe A, etc.)?

The flu and the common cold are both respiratory illnesses but they are caused by different viruses. Because these two types of illnesses have similar flu-like symptoms, it can be difficult to tell the difference between them based on symptoms alone. Special tests that usually must be done within the first few days of illness can be carried out, when needed to tell if a person has the flu.

In general, the flu is worse than the common cold, and symptoms such as fever, body aches, extreme tiredness, and dry cough are more common and intense. Colds are usually milder than the flu. People with colds are more likely to have a runny or stuffy nose. Colds generally do not result in serious health problems, such as pneumonia, bacterial infections, or hospitalizations.

[Source CDC http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/coldflu.htm]

The flu continues to mutate, creating hundreds of strains a year. Therefore vaccines need to be developed with educated guesses as to which will be strain that spreads most. Sometimes the guess is wrong, or a new dangerous strain gets out of control.

5

¿Cuál es la diferencia entre un virus y prion? Nombrar una enfermedad causada por un prion.

The word prion, named in 1982 by Stanley B. Prusiner, is short for “proteinaceous infectious particle” and the word is derived from the words protein and infection. While viruses (and all other known infectious agents, including bacteria, fungi, and parasites) universally contain DNA or RNA, prions contain neither. Instead they are a protein that can fold in multiple, structurally distinct ways, at least one of which is self-propagating and transmissible to other prion proteins. This form of replication leads to disease that is similar to viral infection.

The first prion protein discovered in mammals is the major prion protein (PrP). This infectious agent causes mammalian transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, including bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, also known as "mad cow disease") and scrapie in sheep. In humans, PrP causes Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD), Gerstmann–Sträussler–Scheinker syndrome, Fatal Familial Insomnia and kuru.

All known prion diseases in mammals affect the structure of the brain or other neural tissue and all are currently untreatable and universally fatal.

6

Hacer una de las siguientes:

6a

Dar un breve informe acerca de una pandemia viral y el impacto que causó/está causando en el mundo.

A pandemic (from Greek πᾶν pan "all" and δῆμος demos "people") is an epidemic of infectious disease that has spread through human populations across a large region; for instance multiple continents, or even worldwide. A widespread endemic disease that is stable in terms of how many people are getting sick from it is not a pandemic. Further, flu pandemics generally exclude recurrences of seasonal flu. More recent pandemics include the HIV pandemic as well as the 1918 and 2009 H1N1 pandemics. The Black Death was a devastating pandemic, killing over 75 million people.

Be sure the pandemic you cover is caused by a virus, since many pandemics are bacterial. Historic or current viral pandemics include:

• Yellow fever In 1927 yellow fever virus became the first human virus to be isolated. Yellow fever has been a source of several devastating epidemics.Cities as far north as New York, Philadelphia, and Boston were hit with epidemics. In 1793, one of the largest yellow fever epidemics in U.S. history killed as many as 5,000 people in Philadelphia—roughly 10% of the population. About half of the residents had fled the city, including President George Washington. In colonial times, West Africa became known as "the white man's grave" because of malaria and yellow fever. Yellow fever remains a serious problem in Africa.
• Measles is an endemic disease, meaning that it has been continually present in a community, and many people develop resistance. In populations that have not been exposed to measles, exposure to a new disease can be devastating. In 1529, a measles outbreak in Cuba killed two-thirds of the natives who had previously survived smallpox. The disease had ravaged Mexico, Central America, and the Inca civilization. Before the vaccine was introduced in 1963, there were an estimated 3–4 million cases in the U.S. each year. Measles killed around 200 million people worldwide over the last 150 years. In 2000 alone, measles killed some 777,000 worldwide out of 40 million cases globally.
• Influenza pandemic
• Ebola
• HIV/AIDS considered the main viral long term pandemic
• COVID-19 Also known as COVID-19.

6b

Crear un drama, presentación multimedia u otra exhibición interactiva que informa a una audiencia del peligro de uno o más de estos virus y les da capacitación acerca de cómo combatir o controlar el virus.

6c

Tener un trabajador de ayuda humanitaria dar una charla o presentación acerca de epidemias y control de virus en los países que haya servido. Recaudar dinero como un grupo para apoyar a la ayuda humanitaria al país de que le informa el trabajador.