Naming diseases?

[sarahkjrsten]

Setting: January, 2008

Comments

[azure15]

I don't know about recently, but diseases used to be named after the person who discovered it. ie, Lymes Disease.

[mdyesowitch]

Case in point:
Lou Gehrig's disease/ALS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amyotrophic_lateral_sclerosis

[mdyesowitch]

Not someone who actually discovered it, but someone who brought it into the collective conscience.

[azure15]

Ah.. you know what, that makes much more sense XD

[chipmunk_planet]

Viruses are generally named after what they do (human immunodeficiency virus/HIV) or what kind of syndrome they cause (influenza virus) or what part of the body they assault (rhinovirus).

So figure out what your virus does and name it that way. :D

[chipmunk_planet]

Oh, also the area of the world they infest (Ebola virus).

Viruses are cool for stories that way, you can pretty much name them as you want.

[aekiy]

Was gonna say this. There are a variety of ways to name things. And like the earlier comments say, sometimes diseases -- or the bacteria causing them, or whatever -- are named after people who either discovered the disease, or the bacteria, or made some important contribution. So it's really up to you how you want to name it, and like many diseases, it could have multiple names.

[sucrelefey]

The WHO does have a system though for cataloging just can't remember where to find it. Epidemiology also has procedures for identifying and reporting new stuff but no clue where to find that info.

[busaikko]

In the media, it's generally location+disease, as in Asian bird flu, Spanish flu, etc. So, you could have, for example, OMP (Osaka Multiresistant Pneumonia), named for the first major identified outbreak site.