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Immunology and Disease: Disease and Its Transmission

Smallpox, influenza and viral pathogenicity

  • 3 things to know
  • Component 3

Overview

Antigenic drift in the influenza virus, antigenic shift and how the lytic cycle of a virus damages its host.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Key term

Explain how the lytic cycle of a virus damages its host.

Numbers

In what year was smallpox declared eradicated, and by which organisation?

Key term

Give four features of smallpox that made worldwide eradication possible.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    Name the virus that causes smallpox and state the tissue in which its most obvious effects appear.

    Model answer

    Smallpox is caused by the variola virus, and although it is inhaled into the respiratory tract its most obvious effects are the fluid-filled pustules it produces in the skin.

  2. 2

    How is smallpox spread from person to person?

    Model answer

    It is spread by inhaling droplets breathed out by an infected person, and by direct contact with the fluid or scabs from the pustules or with contaminated bedding and clothing.

  3. 3

    In what year was smallpox declared eradicated, and by which organisation?

    Model answer

    Smallpox was declared eradicated by the World Health Organization in 1980.

  4. 4

    Give four features of smallpox that made worldwide eradication possible.

    Model answer

    There was no animal reservoir and no long-term carrier state, the rash made every case easy to identify, the virus had one stable antigenic type so a single vaccine kept working, and a heat-stable vaccine could be delivered by ring vaccination around each case.

  5. 5

    Which tissue does the influenza virus infect?

    Model answer

    It infects the ciliated epithelium lining the respiratory tract, destroying the cells and leaving the airways open to secondary infection.

  6. 6

    Name the two surface antigens of the influenza virus that define its antigenic types.

    Model answer

    The two surface antigens are haemagglutinin and neuraminidase, which give subtypes their names such as H1N1 and H3N2.

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