Unit 2:  The State of Health: Interactions in Place  
                 Answers to Activities
 
 
 
Activity 2.1  Frames of Reference:  Thinking About Disease in a Place
 

Students should be able to list several factors that are important in explaining or understanding the spread of a disease. Students may use the three-part framework introduced in Unit 2 to help them structure their list. The list below is an example of just some of the factors that could be considered.
 

Environment
Population
Technology
Culture
Disease
temperature
density
air transportation
hunters
vector
precipitation
mobility
land transportation
campers
agent
land cover (habitat)
age
pesticides
frontier mentality
symptoms
urban vs. rural
jobs
antibiotics
traditions
treatment
     
means of living
latency
The diagrams that students prepare should make links between the factors they identify. For example, population mobility is linked to the availability of air and land transportation, which in turn may be linked to levels of economic development; the disease vector is linked to environmental factors, while its treatment may be linked to technology and culture. There are no right or wrong answers to this activity, but students should be able to make some of the more basic connections among these factors.

 
 
Activity 2.2  Demographics and Disease
 
Part A:

Student answers will vary depending on the ten countries chosen for analysis. Make sure that students choose countries from a variety of regions. The variables they consider for each country should include: birth rate, death rate, natural increase, infant mortality, and fertility rate.

  1. growing slowly = B             declining = D

    2. growing rapidly = A            stable = C
     
  2. The answers to question 1 can be determined by looking at the age structure of the pyramid. A pyramid with a wide "base" represents a growing population with a very young age structure. A pyramid with a wide but not as steep a base, indicates that the population is aging and growing more slowly. A fairly rectangular pyramid represents an even age structure and a stable population. And finally, a pyramid with a base that is more narrow than the upper portions indicates that the population is aging, and perhaps declining in size.
Part B:

The death pyramids that students create will vary depending on the cause of death that they choose to investigate. Students’ pyramids should resemble the example below for tuberculosis.

 

 

 Responses to questions 3 through 5 are based on the death pyramids that students create and will vary depending upon the diseases chosen for investigation.

 
 
Activity 2.3  Pollution, Water, and Disease
 
The map below is an example of the types of maps students will create in this activity. Students’ hypotheses about the relationships between the pollution data and cancer and other illnesses will vary depending on the cancer and mortality atlases they use for comparison. In their writing and in the class discussion, be certain that students identify the difficulties in making claims about individual health risks based on aggregate data.
 
 

 
 
 
Activity 2.4  Water Scarcity?  Water-washed Diseases
Responses to the questions in this activity will vary based upon the water scarcity-related disease that students choose. Use the following general comments as guides for assessing students’ work:
  1. For this question, students should describe the links between the scarcity of water and the presence of the disease. Students should be very specific about this relationship. For example, does a certain disease vector thrive in the absence of water, or does water scarcity remove a natural predator?
  1. Diseases that are heavily linked to environmental conditions (i.e., precipitation, humidity, temperature, land cover) can be easily mapped based on common climatic classifications of the world’s biomes. Students should provide a general diagram of the disease’s extent, using lines of latitude and longitude as guides.
  1. Responses to this question depend upon the relationship that is identified in question 1. Students should be able to make the link between the conditions that provide for a disease’s occurrence and the potential impacts to this relationship resulting from global changes. For example, changes in precipitation regimes as a result of climate change may alter the range of habitat for the disease vector. Students should be able to map the potential change in the geographic distribution of the disease based upon their research.
 
 
Activity 2.5  Don't Drink the Water:  Health, Water, and Your Community
Students’ papers will vary depending upon the local water-related health problem they choose to investigate. They should be written with the target audience in mind and should address the entire list of questions on the student worksheet. For Part B of the activity, make certain that students provide sufficient evidence that they have participated in the activities of a local organization and have made contacts with a representative from these groups.

 
 
Activity 2.6  The Agricultural Frontier:  Transformation of Landscape and Transformation of Health
Students’ work in this activity will vary depending upon the area of the world they choose to research. You can reaffirm the importance of this project and insure that students will be creative by scheduling a poster session in which their work will be displayed. Or, arrange to have their work displayed on bulletin boards in the department. As you assess the students’ posters, use the following guidelines: