Epidemiological Concepts In The Movie Contagion

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The movie ‘Contagion’ was released in 2011 depicting the dramatization of a world-wide pandemic of a virus strain killing millions of people in just a matter of months. The movie brought memories as to how global pandemics such as the swine flu were handled a few years back. The movie demonstrated how health professionals would react to a large-scale spread of an unknown virus. During the movie, several epidemiological concepts were addressed. The influential work of epidemiologists and the on-site ground work they have to go through in order to achieve their goal was perceived to be accurate throughout the movie. Some general known concepts they were able to explain were the importance of rates, epidemiological studies, prevention and control …show more content…

The importance of rates is crucial to epidemiologists. It essentially shows how the incidence rate of and prevalence rate of the infection have happened. During the movie, Dr. Cheever would gather data to know how many people were being infected during a set of time, asking for the incident rate. This would signal how fast the virus was spreading and how many people were becoming infected, and dying as well, giving the prevalence rate of the …show more content…

Cheever, along with other health agencies and governments, place preventative measures in order to stop the spread of the disease. That is why the concept of prevention and control of Diseases and Other Health-Related Conditions was crucial to the plot of the movie. According to our book, “the goals of epidemiology are to prevent, control, and… eradicate and diseases and injuries. Dr. Cheever was the first person in the movie to incite some form of regulation. We see it when he, Dr. Cheever, asks Dr. Hextall, who is a scientists at the CDC, to control the virus by only granting access to government official agencies to test and handle the virus. Throughout the movie more severe forms of prevention were taken. They started to close down schools and public buildings, advising for people to stay home and not go out until a vaccine was created for the virus. It got to the point where the U.S. government had the city of Chicago in quarantine. The government was now intervening to control the spread of the disease. Ultimately, creating a vaccine for the virus thanks to Dr.

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