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Cultural and Disease Paper
Introduction
Why are certain communities vulnerable to certain diseases? In many cases, there are diseases that affect a certain community. This can be because of the characteristics of the disease. For instance, a disease may be characterized with cold weather. In such a situation, not all communities live in places of cold weather. This can be caused either by the geographical location of the community or the living standards of the community. As a result, the communities have adopted strategies in which they can prevent the disease. A good example of a disease is tuberculosis. Tuberculosis mainly affects the Hispanic community. Therefore, in this paper, a description of tuberculosis, an explanation of why it affects the Hispanic community and the measures taken to prevent the disease by the Hispanic community are discussed.
Discussion
Tuberculosis is a common disease caused by strains of mycobacterium. It is highly infectious, airborne, and it affects the lungs. Patients who are infected with the disease start exhibiting a chronic cough with blood sputum, fever, weight loss and night sweats. There are also chest pains followed by a prolonged cough. Tuberculosis also affects other parts of the body, but the most common infections are the lungs (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). When affecting other parts of the body it can cause meningitis and fatigue.
There are certain factors that have made the Hispanic community susceptible to tuberculosis. One of the factors is poverty. The Hispanic communities are believed to be the poorest communities. For this reason, they are finding it extremely difficult to rent a house and impossible to buy one (Chavez, 2011). These results in them in staying in small, crowded apartments located in health risk areas prone to other disease. In this situation, it is easy for tuberculosis to spread from one person to another.
Secondly, they are finding it had to acquire health care facilities that will prevent them from the infections. This is because most of them work in low paying jobs that do not offer health care facilities. As a result, they do not have a defense mechanism for the disease. In the end, they become vulnerable to getting infections from tuberculosis (Chavez, 2011). If they were rich, they would easily acquire health insurance and other facilities making it easier for them to prevent tuberculosis.
Lastly, the Hispanic communities are known to engage themselves in risky behaviors. They engage themselves in alcoholism and drug abuse due to the economic hardships that they experience. As it is commonly known, drug abuse and alcoholism are the number one causes of unprotected sex. Unprotected sex results in HIV/AIDS infection. This affects the immune system that combats diseases. The Hispanic communities end up contracting tuberculosis. It should be noted that this is an environmental factor because they live in an environment where they are infected with HIV/Aids resulting to tuberculosis (Chavez, 2011).
The main mode of transmission for tuberculosis is air, that is, it is an air borne disease. This means that tuberculosis moves from one infected person to another through air. In this case, when a person infected with tuberculosis coughs near a person who is not infected, the saliva will expose the mycobacterium to the air. When the uninfected person breathes the air, he or she is likely to get an infection of tuberculosis. However, there is another mode of transmission, which is indirect. In this case, vectors like mosquitoes help in transmitting the disease. It is not common as compared to air as a form of transmitting tuberculosis.
There are prevention or control measures for tuberculosis. The first control measure is isolation. After the patient is confirmed of contracting tuberculosis, he or she is isolated from the rest of the population for a period of not more than two weeks (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). However, this can be more or less, depending on whether the patient is responding to treatment. Additionally, it is essential to check that the patient is not coughing so that they cannot affect the other people who are not infected.
Respiratory protection is another measure of controlling tuberculosis. This is where the person who is treating the infected person wears protective clothing. This clothing should only be worn by the health care workers. It should be free from any other form of penetration, and it should be approved by the relevant health authorities (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). This way it will reduce the chances of people who are taking care of the patient from becoming infected. Additionally, it will reduce the fake protective clothing if a relevant authority checked them.
The other measure is the dilution of the environment. In this case, the room or the area in which an infected person is staying should be diluted. This is where contaminants are removed from the air before infect another person who is not infected. In the process, the tuberculosis mycobacterium is removed thus reducing the chances of people getting infections of tuberculosis (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010).
One of the ways the Hispanic communities are using to protect themselves from tuberculosis is training. Most of the Hispanic leaders are taking the initiative of providing proper training to the Hispanic community about tuberculosis. This initiative is helping them to learn on ways in which they can prevent themselves from contracting the disease. On the other hand, they are gaining proper knowledge of how they can take care of somebody who has contracted the disease (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). Finally, they leaders are trying to ensure that the Hispanic communities are getting the best health care.
The Hispanic communities are extremely religious. In their culture, they believe that it is the wrath of God is working on them because they have angered Him. For this reason, they tend to pray so that they can ask for their forgiveness. Despite the fact that the world is changing globally, the Hispanic communities are still attached to their old cultural beliefs. Additionally, the Hispanic culture is associated with drugs and immorality. This results them becoming HIV/Aids thus making them vulnerable to tuberculosis (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). For this fact, it has led them to be susceptible to tuberculosis and other diseases.
One of strategies to stop tuberculosis from spreading is training the people how to prevent themselves against tuberculosis. This is because prevention is better than cure. Henceforth, people should learn the modes of transmitting tuberculosis. In this case, they should be trained how to stop the air borne transmission. For instance, they should be taught methods such isolation where there is a health care provider available. Secondly, AIDS is another factor that helps in transmitting the disease. In this case, people should be taught ways in which they can protect themselves from contracting HIV/AIDS disease. For instance, they should be told to have protected sex are other ways that are used for protecting against HIV/AIDS.
Conclusion
Tuberculosis is a common disease that affects the lungs. It is transmitted by air, but there are other ways of transmitting tuberculosis. However, it has been noted that, in America, the Hispanic community is vulnerable to contracting the disease as compared to the other communities. This is because the Hispanic communities are exceedingly poor and the environment that they live in is a health hazard. They are prone to other diseases like HIV/AIDS facilitating the spread of the disease. However, there are ways to prevent the disease from spreading like training, respiratory protection and air ventilation. Therefore, the best strategy of prevention is training to help reduce the disease from spreading.
References
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, (2010). Infection Control and Prevention. USA.gov. Retrieved from: http://www.cdc.gov/TB/topic/infectioncontrol/default.htm
Chavez, G. (2011). Poverty and Tuberculosis: Latinos at Risk. University of California. Retrieved from: http://www.public.asu.edu/~squiroga/chavez.HTM
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