首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Climate Change May Make Insect-Borne Diseases Harder to Control Climate change can influence how infectious diseases affect
Climate Change May Make Insect-Borne Diseases Harder to Control Climate change can influence how infectious diseases affect
admin
2013-06-17
85
问题
Climate Change May Make Insect-Borne Diseases Harder to Control
Climate change can influence how infectious diseases affect the world, particularly illnesses spread by vector (传染媒介) like mosquitoes. Now scientists have developed some understanding about how rainfall and temperature can influence malaria, dengue (登革热) and West Nile virus infections as well as ways to combat them.
Vector-borne diseases are among the most complex and annoying illnesses to manage, since so many elements are at play, like host resistance, the environment, urbanization and the pathogens (病原体) themselves. As a result, it’s difficult to tease out any one factor to measure, and with the added effects of warming weather and shifting precipitation (降水), ongoing disease-management efforts are becoming more complicated.
"Climate change is not going to invent any new diseases; it’s going to make controlling existing diseases harder." said Diarmid Campbell-Lendrum, head of the climate change team at the World Health Organization’s headquarters. "We’ve been describing the links between climate change and health for quite a long time."
Diseases spread by mosquitoes are particularly affected by climate change, since the insects lay their eggs in standing water, be it in puddles, ponds, lakes or tide pools. Standing water varies with rainfall, humidity and temperature, with wetter weather typically showing a greater number of mosquitoes. When a female mosquito matures, she can spread infections by drawing blood from an infected host and transmitting the illness to a different host with another bite.
Heat can also influence how a pathogen is spread. In the case of West Nile virus, rising temperatures work both in favor of and against the spread of the disease. "The pathogen—the warmer the temperature, the faster it moves from the blood to being transmitted. It usually takes a while for the virus to get into the mosquito’s salivary glands," said Marm Kilpatrick, an assistant professor in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. "The biting rate also gets faster. So those things are all going to give you more transmission."
On the other hand, hotter weather shortens the mosquito’s life span. "What you basically have going on is three factors going in one direction and one factor in the other direction," said Kilpatrick, who published a paper on West Nile virus last month in the journal Science. "It’s a little bit tricky to make a solid prediction."
West Nile virus is an interesting case study because the disease originated in Africa and emerged in North America in 1999, relatively recently as far as diseases go. Because of this, researchers have tracked where the disease has spread over time. Kilpatrick found that the virus is most abundant in human-developed areas like cities and farms. He also found that the virus quickly adapted to use local mosquitoes in the United States, and hosts like robins played an important role in spreading the virus over long distances.
However, Kilpatrick hesitates to link climate change directly to yearly changes in West Nile infection rates, since land use changes and infected hosts move around. Nonetheless, lessons from climate change and West Nile can be applied to more prevalent diseases. "The same questions we’re wondering about West Nile apply to malaria and dengue," said Kilpatrick. A killer with no cure spreads
Dengue fever is one of the world’s most common diseases, with one-third of the world living in endemic areas (病区), according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It afflicts 900 million people worldwide, and the number is growing, according to Khoa T. D. Thai, a researcher at the Academic Medical Center in Amsterdam and at the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.
Thai, who co-authored a paper on dengue this past summer in Experimental Biology and Medicine, said that the number of people afflicted by the disease is increasing, but part of the rise comes from more awareness and better diagnostics (诊断法) as health care reaches impoverished and rural areas.
The distribution of the disease is also growing, some of which Thai attributes to climate change as regions with tropical climates expand. Since dengue has no cure or vaccine, fighting the disease must focus mainly on prevention, whether it’s draining water to prevent mosquitoes from breeding or wearing long sleeves and using mosquito repellents.
Anticipating climate trends is also important in fighting mosquito-borne diseases, particularly with malaria. "The key step to all of this is to understand what happens with climate variability," said Andy Dobson, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Princeton University. "Although we’ve got some fantastic weather data, it’s always being cleaned up. In general we need much better models for how climate variability affects malaria."
Getting ahead of malaria shifts from climate change is important because people who have been exposed to the parasite (寄生物) the most have the strongest resistance to it, said Dobson, who wrote about this topic in Trends in Ecology and Evolution in June. As the disease moves to new areas, previously unexposed populations may experience an epidemic.
"Malaria will expand particularly in the mountain regions. We’ve seen increasingly strong evidence of that in the east African highlands," he said, noting how drought and rainfall have shifted and warming weather has made mountains more welcoming to mosquitoes.
"Malaria will always come from an interaction between temperature and rainfall," added Dobson. "The rainfall certainly determines the mosquito abundance, and temperature affects the parasites."
Dobson said it is more efficient to combat malaria by using mosquito nets and managing the environment rather than some of the more exotic proposed control measures like lasers to shoot mosquitoes. "Understanding the ecological dynamics of the disease will get you much more bang for your buck," he said. With better climate predictions and land management, Dobson said malaria and other vector-borne diseases can be reduced significantly.
What do we know about the spread of West Nile virus?
选项
A、The warm weather can slow down its transmission.
B、Heat has positive as well as negative effects on its spread.
C、It takes long for the virus to enter the mosquito’s salivary glands.
D、It is easy for experts to make a solid prediction on its spread.
答案
B
解析
同义转述题。定位句表明,炎热能够影响病原体的传播方式,以西尼罗河病毒为例,温度的升高既有助于又有碍于这种疾病的传播。由此可知,B)“炎热对它的传播既有积极影响,也有消极影响”为正确答案。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/lkM7777K
0
大学英语四级
相关试题推荐
A、Husbandandwife.B、Dentistandpatient.C、Lawyerandclient.D、Teacherandstudent.B男士问对方感觉哪儿不舒服;女士述说自己下腭上的一颗牙齿松动,而且疼得整夜都睡不着
A、She’sbusyworkingonherspeech.B、She’swonderinghowtoprepareforit.C、Shehasmorethanonethingtodo.D、Sheisbusy
Manystudentsfindtheexperienceofattendinguniversitylecturestobeaconfusingandfrustratingexperience.Thelecturersp
Manystudentsfindtheexperienceofattendinguniversitylecturestobeaconfusingandfrustratingexperience.Thelecturersp
Jacques-IvesCousteaudiedinParison26June,1997attheageof87.Hisinfluenceisgreat.Scientistsrespectedhiscreative
Jacques-IvesCousteaudiedinParison26June,1997attheageof87.Hisinfluenceisgreat.Scientistsrespectedhiscreative
RaisingWiseConsumersAlmostanyonewithaprofitmotiveismarketingtoinnocents.Helpyourkidsunderstandit’sOKnott
A、Thepatternsofmarriagehavechanged.B、Manydeafpeoplehaveregainedtheirhearing.C、Mostoftheoriginalpopulationhasl
Sleepisveryancient.Intheelectroencephalographic(脑电图仪的)senseweshareitwithalltheprimates(灵长类动物)andalmostallthe
Somefarmersmayreplantcorn.Othersmay【S1】______cornwithsoybeans(大豆).Whatfarmersdonowdependspartlyonthe【S2】______of
随机试题
A.机械性绞窄性肠梗阻B.机械性单纯性肠梗阻C.麻痹性肠梗阻D.血运性肠梗阻早期蛔虫性肠梗阻属
A.过敏反应B.出血倾向C.脑疝形成D.消化道反应E.精神症状为脑血栓形成的患者进行溶栓治疗的过程中,护士应该重点观察;
下列情形中,应当由卫生行政部门注销医师注册的是
施工现场使用的建筑起重机械在拆除__________,使用单位必须到工程所在地登记部门办理使用注销手续。
下列叙述有误的一项是()。
一般情况下,个人医疗贷款的期限最短为()年,最长可达()年。
假定美元利率为6%,日元的利率为2%,则3个月的远期美元对日元()。
竞争性选拔是__________选人视野、打破论资排辈,让优秀年轻干部__________的“绿色通道”,也是公信度高、为干部群众普遍认同的选拔方式。填入划横线部分最恰当的一项是:
拉丁美洲曾深受西方殖民主义之害,这形成了拉美人民在苦难巾反思和抗争的传统,并铸就了_________的精神,正是这种精神气质使拉美电影在世界影坛_________。填入划横线部分最恰当的一项是:
玫瑰城需要100万美元来修理所有的道路。在一年内完成这样的修理之后,估计玫瑰城每年将因此避免支付大约300万美元的赔偿金,这笔赔偿金历年来一直作为给因道路长年失修而损坏的汽车的修理费。以下哪项如果为真,最能支持题干的估计?()
最新回复
(
0
)