Year 9 Science · Unit 1 · Lesson 1
Challenge Worksheet
Learning Goals
Evaluate the claim
Someone claims...
"Non-infectious diseases are less serious than infectious diseases because you can't catch them. Infectious diseases like COVID-19 and the flu kill thousands of people and shut down whole countries, so we should focus our health budgets on preventing infection. Non-infectious diseases like cancer and diabetes only affect individuals who made bad lifestyle choices, so those people should take personal responsibility rather than relying on public health funding."
(a) What part of this claim is supported by the science you have learned? Identify at least one scientifically accurate statement in the claim and explain why it is correct.
(b) What is misleading or scientifically incorrect in this claim? Use data about burden of disease (such as the WHO statistic that non-infectious diseases cause approximately 74% of all deaths globally) to support your answer.
(c) The claim states that non-infectious diseases are caused solely by lifestyle choices. Identify two types of non-infectious disease that clearly contradict this statement and explain why they do.
1. Australia spends significant public health funding on both non-infectious disease control (e.g. healthy eating campaigns, cancer screening) and infectious disease control (e.g. vaccination programs, outbreak response). Using what you know about the two disease types, justify why both categories deserve public health funding.
2. A student argues: "All diseases have the same type of cause, a breakdown in the body's normal functioning." Using the different causes of disease you have learned (pathogens, genetics, lifestyle, environment, immune malfunction), evaluate whether this statement is accurate. Provide specific examples in your answer.
Wrap Up
In one sentence, what was the main idea of this lesson?