Vaccinations

• What are pathogens?


  a organism that causes disease
• What do vaccinations do?

  Allow a dead or altered form of the disease causing pathogen to be introduced to the body , which contain a specific antigen.
• What does the dead or altered form of the pathogen containing an antigen cause?


  the immune system (specifically the white blood cells) to produce complementary antibodies which target and attach to the antigen.
• What is it called when a white blood cell engulfs and digests a pathogen


  phagocytosis
• what happens during the primary infection?

  the antibodies slowly increase, peak at around ten days then gradually decrease.
• What happens during a second exposure to the same pathogen?


  the white blood cells respond quickly in order to produce lots of relevant antibodies, which prevents infection
• What is a placebo?


  an inactive version of a drug given in a drug trial
• How are drugs checked for safety?


  Clinical trials. drugs are tested for efficacy, toxicity and dosage
• What type of drug trials are there?


  blind , double blind and open trials.
• What are the different stages of drug trials?


  Preclinical trials using cells, tissues and animals. Then clinical trials using healthy human volunteers and patients.
• Which drug was originally isolated from willow bark?

  Aspirin
• What is one way to reduce antibiotic resistance?


  only taking antibiotics when necessary
• Why do scientists grow bacteria in the laboratory?


  To allow them to check the effectiveness of antibiotics or antibacterial substances at killing them
• How do antibiotics work?


  Antibiotics damage bacterial cells and kill them. They don’t kill viruses.
• How do vaccines protect people against disease infections?


  Vaccines introduce pathogenic antigens, which cause white blood cells to produce antibodies.
• What is an antigen?


  An antigen is a chemical on the surface of a pathogen. They stimulate the white blood cells to produce antibodies. Antibodies are produced by the white blood cells.