No 6 (2014)

Objective. To evaluate changes in HIV/AIDS awareness among young people living in the Volgograd Region over the past decade. Materials and methods. Young patients aged 15-24 years who lived in the Volgograd Region were interviewed anonymously in 2003-2004 (n = 243) and in 2013-2014 (n = 141). The percentage of the respondents’ answers was estimated in the sample population. The results obtained in the present study were compared with those obtained ten years ago. Results. The levels of awareness about HIV transmission routes, including its parenteral one, among the young people have increased. However, the young people’s awareness about a number questions, such as a vertical transmission of HIV, have even slightly declined; but that about other questions (such as a sexual route of transmission) has not changed dramatically, remaining to be not quite high. Conclusion. HIV/AIDS awareness among the young people living in the Volgograd Region has increased as a whole; however, it is still quite low, which necessitates further health education measures for this category of people, by using the most important information sources (TV and Internet) and by attracting competent authorities and public figures among young people.

Objective. Until the present time, the Republic of Tajikistan (RT) has lacked scientifically sound data on the risk of human brucellosis (RHB) in some administrative units (AUs) located in different altitude zones of the country that is why the aim of this study was to epidemiologically zone the territory of RT according to the degree of RHB. Materials and methods. To estimate the level of RHB, morbidity rates in the past 16 years were ranked by the method described by A.I. Kologorov and coauthors. Results. Fifty-nine of the 65 RT AUs were established to be involved in the epidemiological process of brucellosis: the latter was registered in 21 AUs during 15 and more years, in 28 AUs during 10 to 14 years and in 10 AUs during less than 10 years; only rare cases were notified in 6 A Us. Despite of the wide scatter of the RHB rates in the A Us, there is an altitude-specific tendency in the distribution of RHB rates in the risk groups. The plain zone is characterized by the highest involvement of AUs in the brucellosis epidemiological process (n = 39) with the wide distribution of AUs in all risk groups with a tendency toward the low (31%) and equal distributions of AUs in both the high, moderate, and intermediate risk groups (23% in each). In the piedmont zone, the epidemiological process involved 12 AUs with the highest representation in the moderate (33%) and intermediate (42%) risk groups with some tendency toward a high risk (25%) and no AU in the low risk group. The peculiarities of the mountainous zone are the least involvement of AUs (n = 8) in the epidemiological process and the equal distribution of AUs in all the high and intermediate risk groups with a tendency toward the low risk group (37.5%). Conclusion. The involvement of 59 of the 65 RT AUs suggests that the country is brucellosis-endemic. The wide scatter of RHB rates in all altitude zones of RT is evidence for the decreased influence of an altitude factor (the location of an AU in the definite altitude zone) on the epizootic and epidemiological manifestations of brucellosis due to the predominance of sparse private households over public ones that had been previously concentrated in the definite areas of RT.

The more than 200-year history of vaccination has proven its effectiveness and safety and the importance of maintaining vaccination at high levels to control disease. When the infectious nature of somatic diseases and cancer is clarified, they can be prevented with vaccines now. The emergence of new safer and more effective vaccines and data on the structure of morbidity and mortality of children define the need to expand the immunization schedule. Regional programs are one of the mechanisms for applying the modern approach to vaccination. However, vaccination as the most massive health impact on people should be highly safe. This determines the importance of monitoring adverse events following immunization, improving the health worker training system and public informational work.

Among the causes of demographic damage from influenza pandemics, the contribution of genetic characteristics of the population has been insufficiently analyzed. At the same time, the role of the genetic heterogeneity of populations in a multiethnic country and that of the population distribution of HLA types that determine a high susceptibility to influenza and other infectious diseases have engaged attention. Analysis of the 2009/2011 pandemic leads to the conclusion that its demographic effects can be, to a certain extent, attributed to considerable damage to not only clinical risk groups, but also to the genetic clusters of the population with a particular HLA haplotype. Mutations in the type I interferon system genes in antiviral defense also play an undeniable role. This short review article considers the role of the genetic structure of the population in increased genetically determined susceptibility to pandemic influenza for the first time.

Based on his investigations and on an analysis of the data available in the literature, the author gives the current assessment of possible mechanisms for the development of an epidemic process. By using a model of parenteral viral hepatitis, streptococcal infection, and influenza, the author provides his insight into a comparatively new mechanism for the development of the epidemic process due to the transformation of persistent infection (carriage) forms to a manifest one.

Objective. To study mortality rates in the pediatric population (aged 0-19 years) of the Rostov Region in 2004-2013. Materials and methods. The 2004-2013 official reports of the Rostov Statistics Office were retrospectively analyzed. The pediatric population’s age structure was determined in accordance with the European standard of the age structure (less than 1, 1-4, 10-14, and 15-19 years). Results. The leading causes of death in the pediatric population aged 0-19 years in 2013 were some perinatal conditions (28.9%), external causes (20.9%), congenital malformations and chromosomal abnormalities (16.9%), and other circumstances of death (9%), and infectious and parasitic diseases (8.1%). There was a preponderance of external causes of death, their proportion increased in the structure of overall mortality rates. By 2013 vs 2004, the all-cause mortality among 0-19-year olds decreased by 23% (from 120,659 to 92,964 per 100,000 population of the same age) with the highest rates (50.9%) in the class of Injuries, poisonings, and other consequences of external causes. Mortality rates at the above age were attributed mainly to the deaths of children aged less than 1 year and those aged 15-19 years. The rise in mortality rates for infectious and parasitic diseases in the persons aged 0-19 years in 2012-2013 as compared with their steady decline in 2004-2011 was due to higher death rates in the infants less than 1 year of age and due to septicemia. Conclusion. To work in these identified areas requires that health workers should make every effort to decline deaths among children.