Acute respiratory infection prevention and control?

Answer 1

That depends on whether you are speaking about preventing/controlling an infection out of the blue, or if you are in a health care environment.

If you are talking just in general terms, stay 3 feet away from people that are coughing and sneezing, cover you mouth when you sneeze/cough, but most importantly WASH YOUR HANDS OFTEN AND THOROUGHLY.

In a health care setting, it would depend on the pathogen resposible for the infection. There are several precautions that institutions enact, which include contact precaution, droplet precautions, and airborne precautions.

Contact precautions means you always perform hand hygiene (either hand washing or using a germ-x type of agent) and wearing gloves.

Droplet precaution includes the same as contact, but you also add the use of a gown as well, and a mask if you are within 36 inches of the patient.

Airborne adds a bit more -- all the same stuff as droplet and contact, but add a mask with a hepa filter and a reverse airflow system that sucks air into the room and eliminates it through a special ventilation and exhaust system, keeping it from flowing out into the hallways to other patient rooms.

As far as chemical controls, that would again depend on the pathogen, and the physicians would order the appropriate meds as necessary.