Unit B Lesson B15 Diseases and Treatments
Completion requirements
Lesson B15: Diseases and Treatments
Video Lesson
How do diseases negatively affect human organ systems? How do we prevent and treat illnesses? Watch this video to learn more.
Lesson B15: Diseases and Treatments
Figure B.4.15.1 –Ticks are tiny insects that carry Lyme Disease.
Figure B.4.15.2 – Lyme disease often causes a circular bull’s-eye rash.
Figure B.4.15.3 – Prevent tick bites by tucking your pants into your socks and boots when outside.
Reading and Materials for This Lesson
Science in Action 8
Reading: Pages 159–165
Materials:
Hand cream, glitter, sink, soap, plastic cup, soda cracker, paper towel.
Bacteria, Ticks, and Lyme Disease
Lyme disease is caused by a bacteria. Tiny insects called ticks carry Lyme disease. Humans can become infected with Lyme disease through tick bites. It can be difficult to see or feel a tick bite.
The symptoms of Lyme disease vary from person to person. A large bull’s-eye rash on the skin is one sign of a Lyme disease tick bite. Flu-like symptoms are also common, such as muscle aches, headaches, tiredness, and weak facial muscles. Some people don’t get Lyme disease symptoms at all, or until years later. If you suspect you have Lyme disease, you should visit the doctor. Antibiotics can treat Lyme disease. Untreated Lyme disease can lead to more serious chronic symptoms.
The best way to protect yourself from Lyme disease is to cover up your skin if you’re out in the woods or in grassy fields. Tuck your pant legs into your socks so that ticks can’t land on your legs. Insect repellent containing a chemical called DEET keeps ticks away. After you go outdoors, always check your entire body for tiny black ticks that might be clinging to your skin.
Lyme disease is caused by a bacteria. Tiny insects called ticks carry Lyme disease. Humans can become infected with Lyme disease through tick bites. It can be difficult to see or feel a tick bite.
The symptoms of Lyme disease vary from person to person. A large bull’s-eye rash on the skin is one sign of a Lyme disease tick bite. Flu-like symptoms are also common, such as muscle aches, headaches, tiredness, and weak facial muscles. Some people don’t get Lyme disease symptoms at all, or until years later. If you suspect you have Lyme disease, you should visit the doctor. Antibiotics can treat Lyme disease. Untreated Lyme disease can lead to more serious chronic symptoms.
The best way to protect yourself from Lyme disease is to cover up your skin if you’re out in the woods or in grassy fields. Tuck your pant legs into your socks so that ticks can’t land on your legs. Insect repellent containing a chemical called DEET keeps ticks away. After you go outdoors, always check your entire body for tiny black ticks that might be clinging to your skin.
Watch More
Lyme Disease
Ticks carrying Lyme disease cling onto human skin. Watch this video to see a microscopic view of a tick bite.
Ticks carrying Lyme disease cling onto human skin. Watch this video to see a microscopic view of a tick bite.
This video explains some medical research into Lyme disease.
Watch this news report to learn more about how Lyme disease affects Canadians.
Figure B.4.15.4 – Washing your hands frequently prevents the spread of disease.
Figure B.4.15.5 – Contaminated water can spread disease.
Figure B.4.15.6 – Staying home when sick helps stop the spread of infectious diseases.
Stop Spreading Germs
Contagious, or infectious diseases, spread from one person to another. Good sanitation and hygiene practices are one of the most important ways to prevent the spread of infectious diseases caused by bacteria and viruses.
Washing your hands often and keeping your hands away from your eyes, nose, and mouth prevents the spread of disease. For example, many diseases spread through feces. This is why it is important to always wash your hands after using the toilet.
Diseases also spread through contaminated drinking water. If your community ever has a public water safety advisory, you should follow the directions of your local authorities, which might include boiling water before drinking it. If you drink water from a stream or lake while camping or hiking, you should treat the water before drinking it. Chemical tablets, filters, and boiling are all ways to kill bacteria to make water safe to drink.
Safe food practices prevent diseases from being spread through food. Always wash your hands before preparing food, and before eating. If you handle raw meat, wash your hands and cooking utensils before they come into contact with any other food.
Staying away from sick people also prevents the spread of disease. Patients with very serious diseases are sometimes quarantined, which means they are not allowed into contact with healthy people. You can voluntarily quarantine yourself from other people for less serious diseases. For example, if you are sick with a cold, it is best to stay home and rest, rather than going out into public and infecting other people.
Contagious, or infectious diseases, spread from one person to another. Good sanitation and hygiene practices are one of the most important ways to prevent the spread of infectious diseases caused by bacteria and viruses.
Washing your hands often and keeping your hands away from your eyes, nose, and mouth prevents the spread of disease. For example, many diseases spread through feces. This is why it is important to always wash your hands after using the toilet.
Diseases also spread through contaminated drinking water. If your community ever has a public water safety advisory, you should follow the directions of your local authorities, which might include boiling water before drinking it. If you drink water from a stream or lake while camping or hiking, you should treat the water before drinking it. Chemical tablets, filters, and boiling are all ways to kill bacteria to make water safe to drink.
Safe food practices prevent diseases from being spread through food. Always wash your hands before preparing food, and before eating. If you handle raw meat, wash your hands and cooking utensils before they come into contact with any other food.
Staying away from sick people also prevents the spread of disease. Patients with very serious diseases are sometimes quarantined, which means they are not allowed into contact with healthy people. You can voluntarily quarantine yourself from other people for less serious diseases. For example, if you are sick with a cold, it is best to stay home and rest, rather than going out into public and infecting other people.
Watch More
Stopping the Spread of Infectious Diseases
How do bacteria and viruses spread among people? Watch this video to learn more.
How do bacteria and viruses spread among people? Watch this video to learn more.
Modern transportation allows germs to spread quickly around the world. Watch this video to learn more.
This video explains how contaminated drinking water and a lack of toilets leads to the spread of disease in developing countries.
Try It!
How Do Germs Spread?
Try this simple experiment to see how bacteria and viruses spread from one person to another. You will need to find a family member or friend to help you with this experiment.
Materials:
Try this simple experiment to see how bacteria and viruses spread from one person to another. You will need to find a family member or friend to help you with this experiment.
Materials:
- Hand cream
- Glitter
- Sink
- Soap
- Plastic cup
- Soda cracker
- Paper towel
Instructions:
- Squeeze a small coin-sized amount of hand cream into one hand. Rub the hand cream really well into both of your hands.
- Sprinkle some glitter all over one hand. The glitter represents a harmful virus. The glitter all over your hand represents your hand after opening a doorknob covered in the virus.
- Rub your hands together. What do you observe?
- Pick up the soda cracker. What do you observe?
- Pick up the cup. What do you observe?
- Shake your friend’s hand. What do you observe?
- Try wiping the glitter off your hand with a paper towel. What do you observe?
- Try washing the glitter off your hand with soap and water. What do you observe?
- Watch this video to see a glow-in-the-dark version of this experiment and its results:
Questions:
Think about the following questions very carefully. Then, type or write your answers. After you have your answers, click the questions for feedback.
Think about the following questions very carefully. Then, type or write your answers. After you have your answers, click the questions for feedback.
No, you could not eat the soda cracker without glitter entering your mouth. When you touched the cracker with your hand, glitter “viruses” get on it. If you eat the cracker, these glitter “viruses”, even if there’s just a few of them, will enter
your body.
When you shook your friend’s hand, you spread glitter “viruses” to their hand. Your friend would then spread some of these glitter “viruses” to the next person’s hand.
Glitter “viruses” would spread around your eyes and into your eyes.
Harmful viruses and bacteria enter the body through open mucus membranes like your eyes, nose, and mouth. If your hands are covered in germs, and you then touch a mucus membrane, germs easily spread from your hands into your body.
Washing your hands with soap and water was the most effective way to remove the glitter “virus” from your hands.
Figure B.4.15.7 – Ebola is a disease that requires a quarantine of those infected.
Figure B.4.15.8 – Lab technicians working with ebola use great care to remain safe.
Ebola
Ebola is a virus-caused disease that spreads through contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person. There is currently no vaccine for ebola. The first symptoms of the disease are similar to the flu. Without treatment, it can progress quickly to a skin rash, internal bleeding out of the eyes and ears, and death. In 2014 a major outbreak of ebola occurred in western Africa.
To learn more about ebola and other infectious viruses,
click here to Explore with Elsie.
Make sure you have understood everything in this lesson. Use the Self-Check below, and the Self-Check & Lesson Review Tips to guide your learning.
Unit B Lesson 15 Self-Check
Instructions
Complete the following 6 steps.
Don't skip steps – if you do them in order, you will confirm your
understanding of this lesson and create a study bank for the future.
- DOWNLOAD the self-check quiz by clicking here.
- ANSWER all the questions on the downloaded quiz in the spaces provided. Think carefully before typing your answers. Review this lesson if you need to. Save your quiz when you are done.
- COMPARE your answers with the suggested "Self-Check Quiz Answers" below. WAIT! You didn't skip step 2, did you? It's very important to carefully write out your own answers before checking the suggested answers.
-
REVISE your quiz answers if you need to. If you answered all the questions correctly, you can skip this step. Revise means to change, fix, and add extra notes if you need to. This quiz is NOT FOR MARKS, so it is perfectly OK to correct
any mistakes you made. This will make your self-check quiz an excellent study tool you can use later.
- SAVE your quiz to a folder on your computer, or to your Private Files. That way you will know where it is for later studying.
- CHECK with your teacher if you need to. If after completing all these steps you are still not sure about the questions or your answers, you should ask for more feedback from your teacher. To do this, post in the Course Questions Forum, or send your teacher an email. In either case, attach your completed quiz and ask; "Can you look at this quiz and give me some feedback please?" They will be happy to help you!
Be a Self-Check
Superhero!
Self-Check Quiz Answers
Click each of the suggested answers below, and carefully compare your answers to the suggested answers.
If you have not done the quiz yet – STOP – and go back to step 1 above. Do not look at the answers without first trying the questions.
The man could change his eating habits. He could eat less fats that clog the arteries. He could also exercise more to help blood flow more easily throughout his blood vessels.
Many infectious diseases are spread through feces. Washing your hands after using the toilet prevents the accidental spread of disease through feces particles.
Cities contain a greater number of dust particles in the air compared to rural areas. The greater number of particles comes from increased amounts of car exhaust and industrial smoke. A greater number of dust particles in the air irritates more
people’s lungs, causing more cases of respiratory illness.
There is currently no vaccine for ebola, and many people infected with ebola die. If ebola healthcare workers come into contact with the bodily fluids of a patient, they will likely get infected with ebola. Wearing protective clothing and using
disinfectant prevents workers from becoming infected with ebola.
Modern transportation machines such as airplanes allow people to travel around the world quickly. This allows disease to spread much more quickly around the world than in the past.