WDLF 450 Glossary terms

A reduction in fitness, as assessed by an absence of some measure of health or a decreased adaptability to change.

Can be monitored by pathologic changes in host tissues in response to causative agents, with changes in anatomic, chemical, or physiologic features

A complex condition assessed by one or a combination of specific physical characteristics;

Also can be assessed by the adaptability of a host to change.

Disease affecting many hosts of an area at a given time and at a far greater rate than expected.

Also defined as a sudden, rapid increase in the prevalence of a parasite or disease.

The term often is restricted in usage to human populations, and epizootic to non-human population.

A widespread or world-wide epidemic, generally this term is used in reference to human diseases.

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The number of hosts infected with one or more individuals of a particular parasite species (or taxonomic group) divided by the number of hosts examined for that parasite species.

It commonly is expressed as a percentage when used descriptively and as a proportion when incorporated into mathematical models.

Contrast with incidence and intensity.

The number of new hosts that become infected with a particular parasite during a specified time interval, divided by the number of uninfected hosts present at the start of the time interval.

Contrast to prevalence.

A bacterium, virus, or other microorganism that can cause disease.

An organism that lives in or on a host, from which it derives food and other biological necessities.

Benefits by using host resources, often reducing the host's survival or reproductive success.

A locality or region with the ecological factors that allow the maintenance and transmission of a pathogen;
a small local area or broad geographic region.

The portion of a geographic region with the environmental setting for a specific disease, including the particular ecological factors that allow the maintenance and transmission of the disease agent.

Can be a small local area or broad geographic region and is similar in usage to a biotope, ecosystem or habitat type.

Infectious diseases that can be transmitted between nonhuman animals and humans.

Health is defined as an individual's mental, physical, and psychological well-being.

Disease is defined as the abnormal dysfunctioning of the mental-physical states, which results in illness in a specific individual and does not take into account society or community.

A pathogen is an organism that causes disease. Your body is naturally full of microbes. However, these microbes only cause a problem if your immune system is weakened or if they manage to enter a normally sterile part of your body. Pathogens are different and can cause disease upon entering the body.

A pathogen is an organism which causes a disease. Pathological is a condition of being diseased.

Both parasites and pathogens harm the host; however, the pathogen causes a disease, whereas the parasite usually does not.

One Health is an approach that recognizes that the health of people is closely connected to the health of animals and our shared environment. ...

Close contact with animals and their environments provides more opportunities for diseases to pass between animals and people.