# 5901
Yesterday I wrote about what we might look for in the flu season ahead, but as the movie `Contagion’ showed us, influenza isn’t the only emerging disease threat we have to concern ourselves with.
According to well respected anthropologist and researcher George Armelagos of Emory University we are in a time of emerging (often zoonotic) infectious diseases.
I wrote at some length about this last February in The Third Epidemiological Transition, but briefly:
Mankind’s first disease era, dubbed the Paleolithic Baseline, describes the first few million years of human existence, up to about 10,000 years ago.
During this time mankind existed in small, isolated groups as hunter-gatherers where population size and density remained low. Their sparse interaction with humans and other animals, along with limited range of travel, tended to minimize the effect of infectious diseases.
While diseases diseases and parasites plagued humans, those that required a constant supply of susceptible hosts, tended to die out quickly.
The first epidemiological transition began about 10,000 years ago, when man began to domesticate animals. Q Fever, anthrax, influenza, measles, and tuberculosis all originated in non-human hosts, and jumped to mankind only after animals were brought into the barnyard.
The second epidemiological transition began about 200 years ago, with the industrial revolution. While many of the existing diseases brought forth during the first transition certainly did not go away, new – chronic, non-infectious, degenerative diseases – were added to the mix.
With advances in medicine, sanitation, and technology the average lifespan markedly increased. With that came diseases of age that simply hadn’t been all that common when 40 years was considered a long life (e.g. heart problems, osteoarthritis, cancer).
The Third Epidemiological Transition began in the late 1970s or early 1980s, and is hallmarked by newly emerging infectious diseases, re-emerging diseases carried over from the 2nd transition, and a rise in antimicrobial resistant pathogens.
So on this quiet Sunday morning, a trio of videos on this new age of emerging infectious diseases.
First stop, a 2008 presentation to the Vegetarian Society of Hawaii by Dr. Michael Greger, author of Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching, on the bird flu threat and the rise of emerging infectious diseases.
Next up a lecture by Stanford Professor Lucy Shapiro on Emerging Infectious Diseases and Global Health which covers not only emerging infectious diseases but also the rise of antibiotic resistant organisms as well.
This video is part of the UC Berkeley Graduate Council Lectures, and is from 2009.
Both videos above run approximately 60 minutes.
And for a last stop, a relatively short (6 minute) video produced by the CDC on how their global disease detectives are working to discover, and stop, the next emerging disease threat.
While influenza is the most likely source of the next pandemic, these videos illustrate that it isn’t the only threat out there.
For more on non-influenza pandemic and epidemic possibilities, you may wish to explore:
The Scientific Plausibility of `Contagion’
Bushmeat,`Wild Flavor’ & EIDs
The Pathogen That Lies Ahead
It Isn’t Just Swine Flu
Nathan Wolfe And The Doomsday Strain
