Bench Mark Assessment-Epidemiology Paper Assignment

Bench Mark Assessment-Epidemiology Paper - Assignment Example A sneeze is capable of releasing up to 40, 000 droplets of tuberculosis microorganisms, and a single droplet is enough to transmit the infection. People with frequent contact with individuals infected with the disease are at a higher risk of contracting the infection with an estimated infection rate of 22%. An untreated person with active TB can infect between 10 and 15 people in a year. The chances of transmission of TB from one person to another is dependent on factors like the amount of infectious droplets expelled by the infected individual during the sneezing episode, the duration of exposure to the droplets and the ineffectiveness of ventilation. TB infection in an individual can exist in the form of an active disease or the form of a latent infection. An individual with the latent form of the disease does not feel sick and presents with no signs and symptoms of the infection. Latent form of TB is only diagnosed through a tuberculin skin test or a TB blood test. People with the latent TB are not infectious despite possessing the mycobacterium. Individuals with the active form of TB presents with the signs and symptoms of the infection in addition to the positive tuberculin skin test and the TB blood test (Golden & Vikram, 2005). The most active form of TB is the pulmonary tuberculosis that presents in about 90% of the cases. Pulmonary TB affects the lungs and manifests with chest pain, prolonged coughing and sputum production. In extreme cases of the condition, an individual can cough small amounts of blood a manifestation of the erosion of the pulmonary artery. Extra pulmonary tuberculosis accounts for 15-20% of the active cases of the disease. These are conditions caused by Mycobacterium tuberculin but affect structures out of the lungs. Extra pulmonary tuberculosis is common among the immunosuppressed individuals