The term morbidity is a term of medical and scientific use and serves to indicate the number of people or individuals considered sick or victims of a disease in a given space and time. Morbidity is, then, a highly important statistical data to be able to understand the evolution and advance or regression of a disease, as well as the reasons for its emergence and possible solutions.
the morbidity rate is the result of dividing the number of sick people by the population as a whole
Morbidity is a demographic and health data that fulfills the function of informing the proportion of people who suffer from a disease in a limited space and time. This is so in order to better analyze the evolution of such disease in particular conditions since by delimiting it, the effects and phenomena produced are more easily observable. Morbidity is especially used by epidemiology, the discipline of medicine that specializes in the analysis and study of the progress of different epidemics in different types of population.
According to the results obtained from research based on morbidity, specialists can know the power or the effect that a disease has on a population, at the same time that they can analyze the causes of such a situation and seek possible solutions for the future (solutions that can range from vaccines or specific remedies to changes in access to essential living conditions for human beings).
Certain diseases can have serious consequences for a population as a whole
Let us think of a territory where its inhabitants are mainly engaged in mining and, as a consequence, pathologies associated with this work activity occur. This situation has health, social and economic repercussions.
Morbidity can be analyzed from different parameters, since there are the incidence rate, the prevalence rate, the case rate and the fatality rate as specific parameters.
The incidence rate refers to the number of people who acquire a disease over a specific period of time. This information is of vital importance to prevent diseases or to organize a vaccination system.
The prevalence rate refers to the number of individuals with a specific medical condition. This data provides relevant information to know the health levels of a population with respect to a disease. In the case of Latin America, malaria control depends largely on knowledge of this rate.
The official control of the number of people who have a certain pathology is known as the control rate.
The fatality rate refers to the percentage of the population that dies as a result of a disease.
Mortality and Morbidity are two concepts that should not be confused
The idea of morbidity refers to diseases, while mortality is an indicator of the number of deaths in a population. Obviously, both concepts have a certain relationship, since morbidity can trigger the phenomenon of mortality.
The data related to the mortality of a country are an important indicator to know the quality of life of the population. The infant mortality rate is a parameter that affects a nation as a whole, as it provides information on various aspects (the health system, social conditions, economic situation, etc.).
