Dear Reader:

Glossary, continued:

Human Viral Immunity: the ability of a human body to resist a harmful virus from entering and multiplying in it.

Active Immunity: happens in one of the following ways: (1) Naturally, when an infected individual produces antibodies for the infecting virus. After recovery, the body remembers the virus, and when encountering it again, it produces the same antibodies as before, or (2) Artificially, when an uninfected individual is vaccinated, that is: a weak form of the virus  is artificially introduced to the body, the body reacts by producing antibodies for that virus. In the future, when encountering the same virus (a stronger version of it), the body will produce the same antibodies as it did following vaccination.

Passive Immunity(also called passive antibody therapy): antibodies from an immune person are transferred to a non-immune person via blood transfusion. The body of the receiver does not develop memory for the antibodies it passively receives, so the person is at risk of being infected by the same virus at a later time. It is a short term immunization.

Herd Immunity (also called population immunity, or social immunity): occurs when a large percentage of a population has become immune to an infection either by having been infected and  recovered from the infection before, producing antibodies as a result, or by being vaccinated. Individuals who are vulnerable to the infection, that is, not immune to it, are protected from the virus by being surrounded by people who are immune.

Viral vaccine (simplified): a weak form of a virus artificially introduced to an uninfected individual so to stimulate the body to produce antibodies for the virus, the body then remembers the virus/ antibodies, and will produce the same antibodies if and when it encounter that virus again. A vaccine can be specific to a particular virus or non specific.

Non-specific vaccine: a vaccine that protects an individual from more than one virus. For example, the BCG vaccine was developed against tuberculosis but has shown to protect individuals against respiratory infection.

Antiviral drugs/ medications: medications that don’t destroy the virus, but inhibit the virus’s development, so that the infected person experiences less severe symptoms and a shorter duration of symptoms. Most antiviral medications are specific to a particular virus, and some are broad spectrum, that is, they treat a variety of viruses.

Flattening the curve: lowering the number of new infections per day, so that there is a spreading out of new infections over a long period of time. That way, fewer new patients need hospitalization per day, and hospitals are able to handle the lesser influx of new patients (instead of being overwhelmed by a spike of new patients, not having enough beds, equipment, staff and services to handle the spike). The flattening of the curve is achieved by social distancing and hygiene practices.

Worldometer: a reference website that provides real time statistics for such things as world population, economics and health. It is owned and operated by data company Dadax which generates revenue through online advertising. It is part of the Real Time Statistics Project, and is managed by an international team of developers, researchers, and volunteers. In 2011, it was voted as one of the best free reference websites by the American Library Association. In early 2020, the website gained popularity during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Wikipedia: a multilingual online encyclopedia, the largest and most popular general reference work on the World Wide Web. It features exclusively free content and no commercial ads, and is owned and supported by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non profit organization funded primarily through donations. Originated in the US in English, it is now available in 285 languages. The English Wikipedia has almost 40 million registered editors, and over 144,000 active editors. Jimmy Wales (one of the two creators of the site) said that “over 50% of all the edits are done by just 0.7% of the users.. 524 people.. And in fact, the most active 2%, which is 1400 people, have done 73.4% of all the edits”.

(I used Wordometer and Wikipedia in my previous threads and will use these resources again).

anita

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