Age Structure of Ebola Outbreaks

Topic

Resource Type

Level

High School — General High School — AP/IB College

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Description

This activity guides the analysis of a published scientific figure from a study that investigated demographic patterns in Ebola outbreaks from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Between 1975 and 2014, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) experienced seven outbreaks of Ebola virus disease. In this study, scientists analyzed the demographics, including sex and age, of the individuals who had contracted Ebola during these outbreaks. The figure compares the sex and age distributions for 996 suspected, probable, or confirmed Ebola cases (purple bars) to those of the overall DRC population (orange bars). The “Educator Materials” document includes a captioned figure, background information, graph interpretation, and discussion questions. The “Student Handout” includes a captioned figure and background information.

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Student Learning Targets

Analyze and interpret data from a scientific figure.
Identify and compare demographic characteristics using age structure diagrams (population pyramids).

Estimated Time

Within one 50-minute class period.

Key Terms

demographic structure, demography, epidemiology, population diagram, population pyramid, virus, zoonotic disease

Primary Literature

Rosello, Alicia, Mathias Mossoko, Stefan Flasche, Albert Jan Van Hoek, Placide Mbala, Anton Camacho, Sebastian Funk, et al. “Ebola virus disease in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 1976-2014.” eLife 4 (2015). https://doi.org/10.7554/elife.09015.

Terms of Use

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