Mod and Moq,
Nothing to be ashamed of: Epidemiology is rarely studied except in graduate school. It is simply the study of disease in populations (as opposed to individuals). It is how we know things like
Cigarette smoking causes cancer
The HIV virus causes AIDS
Vaccines do not cause autism
Diabetes causes heart disease and blindness
Unfortunately I’m only paid to teach medical students and graduate students and not the general public; we public health folks have not done a good job of explaining things to the general public and as a result there are a lot of things that people believe that aren’t true.
I may start a separate thread on epidemiology in Nach and Shas.