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Casual contact at the worksite shows no link to AIDS virus.

Anderson KE; Baker EL; Melius JM; Mullan RJ; Figueroa AE

Occupational Health and Safety News Digest 1987 Mar; 3(3):4-5

00190449

The question of whether persons infected with the acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) virus should be restricted from job duties was discussed. Topics discussed included risk groups, the decision to exclude from work, methods of transmission, unlikely vehicles of transmission, and preventive measures. The most common means of transmitting AIDS were intimate sexual contact with an infected person, use of a contaminated needle or syringe, and transmission from infected pregnant women to their unborn infants. Other means of transmission have included transfusion of infected blood, and clotting factors concentrate contaminated with the AIDS virus in hemophiliacs. Five percent of all reported AIDS cases have not been placed in any of the recognized transmission categories. This group contained no AIDS cases known to result from occupational or household transmission of the AIDS virus. According to the authors, there is no evidence which would suggest that persons infected with the AIDS virus should be excluded from the work place. Neither should they be restricted from using the phones, office equipment, reusable respirators or other personal protective gear, bathrooms, showers, eating places or any other workplace facility. Good personal hygiene, correct use of respirators and regular cleaning of such equipment, careful attention to cleanliness during administration of first aid during medical emergencies, and cleaning up of blood and other bodily fluids correctly should be standard procedure for any job situation.

Acquired-immune-deficiency-syndrome; AIDS-virus; Viral-diseases; Disease-transmission; Health-care-personnel; Personal-protective-equipment; Sexually-transmitted-diseases; Occupational-exposure

19870301

Journal Article

1987

3

DSHEFS

Occupational Health and Safety News Digest

OH