This course provides an introduction to many important topics in epidemiology for public health practice  including but not limited to the evolution of the discipline  causal concepts in the natural history of disease  critical features of infectious and chronic diseases  elements of public health screening  basic measures used in epidemiology  design of epidemiologic investigations  consideration of random error and systematic bias  calculation and interpretation of confidence intervals and p values  discussion of confounding and interaction  criteria for evaluation of cause and effect relationships and the implications for ethical public health practice