The Disease Detectives

„The Disease Detectives“ is a free educational comic book from 2007 about the methods needed to conduct an outbreak investigation. It was created as a teaching tool by epidemiologists Esther and Florian for children and other curious beings. It is available in English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Czech, German, Chinese, Norwegian, Danish, Russian, Persian and Hebrew versions. 

Published outbreak investigations and case studies used in training exercises were screened and scripted into a comic about a fictitious food-borne outbreak of salmonella after a neighbourhood barbeque. The story follows three friends who eventually find out the true reason why none of their friends can come play football with them...

• Illustrations were hand-drawn on A3 Bristolboard paper with pen and ink
  
• Scans were edited with free open source software Inkscape and Gimp
  
• Copyrights were put under a creative commons license
  
• Separation of graphics and text allows easy translation
  

The comic was first introduced at ESCAIDE 2007 conference with this poster. The Disease Detectives comic was featured in the November 2008 issue of Eurosurveillance.

• English version by Esther Kissling, penciler, inker, colourist.
• German version by Florian Burckhardt, idea, script, lettering.
• Norwegian version by Hege Line Løwer. Hege is an epidemiologist at the Norwegian Folkehelseinstituttet, Oslo, doubling as a teacher in health promotion for children.
• French version by Vincent Auvigne. He can be contacted at www.ekipaj.com.
• Portuguese version by Marion Mühlen.
• Spanish version by Martha.
• Chinese version by Wei Cai. 
• Russian version by Inna. 
• Czech version by Michaela Špačková.
• Danish version by Steen Ethelberg and his kids.
• Hebrew version by Michael „Mixi“ Naveh.
• Persian version by Dr. Reza Assadi

Help us translating „The Disease Detectives“ into YOUR language! Download the translation package (3.9 MB). 

The comic was first introduced at ESCAIDE 2007 conference with this poster. The Disease Detectives comic was featured in the November 2008 issue of Eurosurveillance.