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Suggesting that Bill Gates is making these statements and not just repeating the primary source that should be cited is ludicrous. Bill Gates is a billionaire best known for his for being for taking intellectual property from Xerox and re-marketing it as his own product (the irony of then later taking the credit for other scientists and re marketing it as his own to improve his public image as a pirate and a thief is really mind-bending), then taking the profit from that to hire engineers to build new other products.
Bill Gates is not and has never been a scientist, he is certainly not an epidemiologist, and perhaps most importantly has no formal training or education on any biological sciences. His name being on a charity does not provide him with super powers, or special knowledge. If anything, it is widely understood by historians that when billionaires (or the equivalent throughout history) open up charities later in their careers are primary used to avoid taxes, grant them the ability to wield some political power, and most importantly: white-wash their public image.
Crediting him for statements he said on NPR, that were clearly made by actual epidemiologist (in fact, as a Biologist I absolutely have heard these statements made many times, also citing epidemiologists is to willfully pretend that he was involved in epidemiological research in any way.
To pretend that he is an somehow an expert in epidemiology, or that these statements are his when he is clearly repeating lines he was told or he read in an abstract of an actual peer-reviewed paper on epidemiology is not just so absurd that it reeks of a PR consultant using this article and articles like it to enhance his public image, but **most importantly it violates Wikipedia's guideline**. The fact that I have to even say this is really suspect. This is obvious to anyone has is even somewhat familiar with Wikipedia.
There are rules about using primary sources, and I have a hard time believing anyone in good faith honestly thought that national public radio, is a primary source for epidemiological facts instead one of the many epidemiological peer-reviewed journals.
The problem in this article is so bad that there is more direct quotes from Bill Gates as previously stated "he is clearly repeating lines he was told by an epidemiologist or he read in an abstract of an actual peer-reviewed paper on epidemiology" than actual quotes from epidemiologists or even quotes from sources that are from peer-reviewed epidemiological journals.**
Citing his statements in an interview on NPR, when we all know hes not an epidemiologist, and has never written a peer reviewed scientific article means he is second hand source, and that using this source violating Wikipedia's guidelines and requirements. And I have a really hard time believe anyone in good faith honestly thought otherwise.
This article should have been quoting and citing scientific articles, and why do I even need to says this? An article on a scientific topic where "npr.org" used many times? This should have been a red flag for every editor who has read this. When everyone knows NPR is not even science focused, and it is certainly NOT a primary source for anything science related, and not epidemiology.
In fact, if anything, scientists I talk to know NPR regularly fails to properly report things on the topic of science. They are a very poor resource even simple science related coverage. They regularly misreport the rise in Heroine deaths in the United States as a "Heroine Epidemic", which is not just in accurate in the scientific sense, its inaccurate in every sense from definition to the fact that is the numbers being reported for Heroine overdose would have qualified car deaths as an epidemic for the last 50 years running, but you will absolutely never find any reference to car deaths being an epidemic. Whoever authored that section appear to be involved in public relations, obviously there is no real way to prove it but the blatant violation of Wikipedia Guidelines make it appear at least surface to be a public relations related. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Faraday-mage ( talk • contribs) 00:21, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Epidemic is used, generally, to refer to the spread of pathogens in a population. Demos is greek for 'upon the population' and as such is technically able to be (and is in scientific literature) used instead of the needlessly more complicated epizootic or epiphytotic. Epidemiologists can refer to those who study epidemics in humans, plants and animals. I'm forwarding the idea that this whole page needs a re-write in terms of epidemics as it is generally used with sections for humans, animals and plants. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.155.96.6 ( talk) 10:51, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
I do not know what epidemic
Please somebody add what causes epidemics to spread. -Thanks
When you mention "non-biological" uses, I think you mean "non-infectious-disease". Surely everyone agrees that obesity, drug addiction, and mental illness are biological! I would suggest changing this to read "other" uses.
Perhaps a true non-biological "epidemic" would be something like a video game or clothing fashion? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.86.8.103 ( talk) 12:46, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
What does the line "Epidemics lead to death of people" in the non-biological section mean? It's completely inappropriate and out of the blue! Well, that's my opinion anyway. -- 24.46.164.83 05:25, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
I introduced more text. Please make internal links at important words on the text. KVDP ( talk) 18:45, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
There is a call to merge Pandemic#Pandemics and notable epidemics through history (which is a full description) into Epidemic#Notable epidemics through history (which is a stub-and-pointer).
I disagree, don't merge, even at the price of duplication. This section contributes valuable information to anyone looking up Pandemics, which is probably millions of people about now. Jdonovan43 ( talk) 23:45, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps healthmap ( http://www.healthmap.org/en/ ) should be mentioned as a pre-emptive measure ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.182.223.239 ( talk) 09:32, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
The link included only references a PDF entitled “Report of the WHO/FAO/OIE joint consultation on emerging zoonotic diseases.” It doesn’t tell us anything about what WHO nor anyone else is doing to pre-empt new epidemics. (It’s not that I doubt they are doing something, but some clue as to what would help.) 174.25.121.131 ( talk) 16:29, 7 October 2010 (UTC)A REDDSON
Las crisis sanitarias no tienen porque ser necesariamente una epidemia o una pandemia, pueden originarlas también desastres de origen humano o natural. Las crisis sanitarias pueden proceder de alimentos, de infecciones, o problemas medioambientales; siempre suponiendo que estemos en tiempos de paz. Las actuaciones para resolverlas son múltiples: médicas, económicas, políticas, etc. Pueden afectar a una localidad concreta, a una región, a un país, a un continente o a todo el planeta. Por todo ello, crisis sanitaria (Health crisis) no corresponde con epidemia (epidemic) y debe ser un artículo independiente. Un cordial saludo: Raimundo Pastor ( talk) 15:18, 28 August 2011 (UTC)
Concept | Health crisis | Epidemic |
---|---|---|
Source | disease, disaster, war, Food, Drug, etc | only disease |
Transmission | yes / not | yes (infectious disease) |
Prevention | Medical, Politic, Social, Ecologic, Military, Economic, etc | Medical (only) |
Diagnosis | Medical, Economic, Politic, Social, Ecologic, etc | Medical (only) |
Treatment | Medical + Social + Economic + Politic, etc | medical treatment (mainly) |
List | List of disasters, List of epidemics, Food safety scandals, List of medicine contamination incidents, etc | List of epidemics |
Friendly: Raimundo Pastor ( talk) 22:31, 28 August 2011 (UTC)
The main paragraph in the Causes section has the names of certain diseases in capital letters, for no apparent reason. Unless this is usually for disease names (which I'm fairly sure it isn't), then my only guess is that it's vandalism or was an inexperienced editor's attempt to create links. Does anyone object to me replacing them with non-caps words and making some of them into links? 150.203.192.134 ( talk) 06:19, 3 October 2012 (UTC)
As ref #1 (the CDC text on Fundamentals of Epidemiology) and other sources note, epidemics need neither involve large numbers of people, be rapid, nor even be transmissible - yet those are the clear messages in the lead. Any increase (sudden or not) of any disease (communicable or not) above its baseline incidence (high or low) in a population is considered an epidemic. A subsequent section does note that the epidemic might be something non-transmissible like obesity, and the last sentence of the lead does acknowledge that high rates are not a requirement for "epidemic" status, but the lead sentence should not be so restrictive - it's all many readers will see. I am reluctant to boldly change that lead sentence without discussion, because (i) it might not be understood by active editors here, and (ii) a major change in the focus of the article is the subtext - the second paragraph, for example, might be out of place if the focus weren't so squarely on communicable disease. — soupvector ( talk) 23:54, 10 September 2016 (UTC)
"epidemic the occurrence of more cases of disease, injury, or other health condition than expected in a given area or among a specific group of persons during a particular period. Usually, the cases are presumed to have a common cause or to be related to one another in some way (see also outbreak)."The Introduction of that text, on page 1-73, uses language we could consider:
"The previous description of epidemics presumes only infectious agents, but non-infectious diseases such as diabetes and obesity exist in epidemic proportion in the U.S."— soupvector ( talk) 02:02, 11 September 2016 (UTC)
I was searching for a information about what defines an obesity epidemic and ended up here. The definition here seems to imply an epidemic must be the rapid spread of an infectious disease. But since obesity is not infectious, perhaps a broader definition would be more appropriate. How about making the definition closer to the Merriam-Webster definition; something like: "An epidemic is a disease or medical disorder that affects a large proportion of a population at a particular time." Following that, it could be mentioned that epidemics typically involve the rapid spread of an infectious disease, etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1.165.233.4 ( talk) 01:35, 9 May 2017 (UTC)
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In the "Causes" section, it's stated that an epidemic is not required to be contagious, and it's pointed out that the term is applied by the WHO to the "obesity epidemic." Given that obesity is not an infectious disease, it seems this contradiction should be resolved by deleting the word "infectious" in the first sentence in the lead. I'll be doing this if nobody has any objections. Global Cerebral Ischemia ( talk) 12:53, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
Vulnerability of the topic 103.171.194.54 ( talk) 04:09, 12 December 2021 (UTC)
A few comments:
So the editor above was blocked for being a sockpuppet, but his terrible edits are still here. I have no idea why he wasn't immediately reverted. The lead is now largely incomprehensible and even incompetent, and the body has suffered too. Reverting by hand would take a very long time so I'm reverting to the last state before he made those edits. Since then the only edits have been people fixing some of his many spelling mistakes and some other minor changes anyway. Prinsgezinde ( talk) 21:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Што мешает в кассовые аппараты встроить излучатели ультрафиолета ? Если даже полупроводниковые. Да ничего. 85.140.11.44 ( talk) 03:23, 29 July 2023 (UTC)
I've just removed an IP-sourced para about waves. I haven't found a reliable secondary source to substantiate it. WP:NOR and WP:SECONDARY apply. Bob ( talk) 20:56, 29 August 2023 (UTC)