--- title: Public Health & Epidemiology description: This field analyzes health patterns, disease distribution, and preventative strategies within populations. Learners will understand how to track outbreaks, evaluate health policies, and implement community-wide interventions to improve public health outcomes. category: health-medicine subcategory: medicine-and-health-sciences difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced url: /subject/public-health-and-epidemiology --- # Public Health & Epidemiology This field analyzes health patterns, disease distribution, and preventative strategies within populations. Learners will understand how to track outbreaks, evaluate health policies, and implement community-wide interventions to improve public health outcomes. ## Available Resources 2 Books • 6 Courses • 2 Websites ## Courses ### 1. Physics of COVID-19 Transmission (MIT RES.10-S95) **Author:** Martin Bazant, Joey Gu, Alex Cohen Lightboard lectures on the physics of indoor airborne disease spread: how occupancy, exposure time, room geometry, ventilation, filtration, humidity, masks and respiratory activity interact. 49 short videos let learners estimate transmission risk and apply a quantitative indoor safety guideline. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/res-10-s95-physics-of-covid-19-transmission-fall-2020/ **Tags:** airborne-transmission, aerosols, ventilation, indoor-air-quality, transport-phenomena ### 2. Epidemics - the Dynamics of Infectious Diseases **Author:** Ottar N. Bjornstad, Marcel Salathé, Rachel A. Smith, Mary L. Poss et al. Introductory Penn State course on how infectious diseases spread through populations and how outbreaks are controlled. Modules cover pathogens and R0, immunity, disease ecology, superspreading and surveillance, vaccination and herd immunity, eradication, drug resistance and emerging diseases. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/epidemics **Tags:** epidemiology, infectious-disease-dynamics, herd-immunity, vaccination, disease-surveillance ### 3. Principles of Epidemiology in Public Health Practice, Third Edition (SS1978) **Author:** Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC's six-lesson self-study text on applied epidemiology and biostatistics, with exercises and self-assessments. Covers measures of risk, data display, surveillance systems, and the ten steps of outbreak investigation as public health practitioners actually perform them. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://archive.cdc.gov/www_cdc_gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/index.html **Tags:** epidemiology, biostatistics, outbreak-investigation, public-health-surveillance, public-health-practice ### 4. Introduction to Health Policy **Author:** Indranil Mukhopadhyay Seven-module Coursera course from O.P. Jindal Global University covering health systems, social determinants, health economics, financing mechanisms, and universal health coverage. Completing it gives you vocabulary and frameworks for reading health policy debates in developing-country contexts. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/introduction-to-health-policy-1 **Tags:** health-policy, health-systems, health-economics, universal-health-coverage, social-determinants-of-health ### 5. Epidemiology Imperial College London's second course in its Epidemiology for Public Health specialization. Walks through cross-sectional, case-control, cohort and experimental designs, their relative strengths, biases and appropriate uses, so students can choose and critique a design for a given research question. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/study-designs-epidemiology **Tags:** courses, health-medicine, medicine--anatomy ### 6. Epidemics **Author:** Gabriel M. Leung, Joseph T. Wu, Kwok-Yung Yuen University of Hong Kong course on infectious disease epidemics: pathogen emergence and ecology, outbreak investigation, epidemiological modeling, surveillance, non-pharmaceutical interventions, vaccination, and risk communication. Learners can explain how epidemics start and spread and how public health responds. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Duration:** 10 weeks of study, 2-3 hours/week | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/hkuepidemics **Tags:** epidemiology, infectious-disease, outbreak-control, disease-modeling, risk-communication ## Websites ### 1. Our World in Data WHO public health and epidemiology hub **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.who.int/health-topics/epidemiology ### 2. cdc.gov The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) is the U.S. federal public health agency. It provides evidence-based information on disease prevention, vaccines, travel health, and preventive-care guidelines, plus data and resources for public health and outbreak updates. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://cdc.gov **Tags:** websites, health-medicine, health-and-wellness ## Podcasts ### 1. Population Health **Author:** Population Health Exchange A journal club podcast from Boston University's Population Health Exchange in which epidemiologists Matt Fox, Christopher Gill and Don Thea dissect recent public health studies, showing listeners how to appraise study quality and interpret contested findings. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en-US | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://populationhealthexchange.org/category/free-associations/ **Tags:** epidemiology, public-health, study-design, research-appraisal, podcast ### 2. Public Health On Call **Author:** Joshua Sharfstein, Stephanie Desmon, Lindsay Smith Rogers Podcast from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in which experts explain current public health news, from outbreaks and vaccines to health policy and aging. Listeners learn to interpret health headlines through epidemiological evidence rather than speculation. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://publichealth.jhu.edu/headlines/public-health-on-call-podcast **Tags:** public-health, epidemiology, health-policy, health-news, outbreaks ## Books ### 1. Epidemiology **Author:** Leon Gordis Leon Gordis's introductory epidemiology textbook, used widely in medical and public health programs. Covers measures of disease frequency, study designs, bias and confounding, causal inference, screening and outbreak investigation, giving readers the tools to read epidemiologic literature critically. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/072168338X?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, health-medicine, medicine--anatomy ### 2. The Ghost Map **Author:** Steven Johnson Steven Johnson's narrative account of the 1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak in London and John Snow's investigation of it. Readers come away understanding how mapping, case interviews and spatial reasoning established waterborne transmission and founded modern epidemiology. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/1594482691?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, health-medicine, medicine--anatomy --- *This content is part of Dantes.io - Your Treasure Map to Knowledge* *Curated by humans at Dantes.io. Personal study use welcome; republishing this curation requires permission (team@dantes.io).* View this page online: https://dantes.io/subject/public-health-and-epidemiology