Yellow Fever, Black Goddess by Christopher Wills

In his book yellow fever, Bad Goddess, Wills uses different cultures and scenes in portraying his views about human health. Wills use the character by the Name Wilma who is also a nurse in setting the stage in his discussions. The fact that Wilma is a nurse helps in setting the stage on issues that are related to public health. He uses a very ordinary scene whereby, Wilma while walking to her place of work, a person with pathogens infections collapses in her feet. This event marks the first discovery of an outbreak among the community. Therefore, he uses this scene to demonstrate that actually, human race is at risk of infections because of pathogens in our midst. This is a public health issues that Wills explore further in his book by explaining and describing some of the complexities and strains of these pathogens, how they can be managed and controlled to ensure that human beings are free from their threats.

In his article, Waldvogel urges that infectious diseases consists of two worlds; that of microbial world and human physiology (5). Even though, these two worlds exist in the same environment and are governed by same laws of nature, they have some differences. He points out that these pathogens are older than human physiology. Therefore, an evolution has continued to take place billions years back, characterized by chemosynthesis’s transforming to the modern pathogens. This evolutions has made some of the pathogens to develop adaptation features to allow them survive in the human bodies hence posing threats of infections and diseases. He furthermore, asserts that human civilization, which has come with global impacts on environment through chemicals, climate detergents and physical actions, has contributed to emergence of diseases. This, therefore, requires full understanding of these three domains in order to combat them in a better way.

Like Waldvogel and Wills, Mayer is also concerned about the state of public health. The emerging infectious disease caused by pathogens is an issue that has received increased attention. New diseases are emerging every day both in the developed or developing countries, with threats posing challenges of solving them (Mayer 937). The likely ecological web causation of these diseases includes the economic, social, environmental and even biological influences or factors. Therefore, people are at risks of contracting these infections and endangering their lives.

Wills opinions in his book and these two articles to some extent are related. They all cite human factors and physiology as one of the causes of pathogens and infections. The works also try to explain those factors that increase human survival and those that increase pathogen survival. For instance, the climate change or environment change, evolutions and other factors contribute to the modification and adaptation of these pathogens, which result to different infections. However, Wills challenges or refutes claims by other people that new pathogens are more dangerous as opposed to the older ones. He believes that all pathogens pose equal threats to the human life.

All these articles are trying to provide some insights on the ever-increasing number of infections around the world. They express their concerns in the future but are optimistic that with good response to these infectious and pathogens future human diseases will be contained and these pathogens will not cause a threat to the survival of people. Both articles attribute human activities as one of the important factors causing an increase in diseases.

Works Cited
Mayer, Jonathan. “Geography, ecology and emerging infectious diseases.” Social Science &

Medicine, 50.7/8 (2000): 937-952. Print.

Waldvogel, Francis. “Infectious diseases in the 21st century: old challenges and new opportunities.” International Journal of Infectious Diseases, 8.1 (2004): 5-12. Print.