Unit 12B: Diseases and Infection
Assessment of methods used to prevent that transmission and spread of infectious
diseases.
The following report assesses how effective different methods disease prevention are in
preventing the transmission and spread infectious diseases. I will explain the usage of
the method, any draw backs and my overall conclusion to whether or not the method is
useful or not.
PPE
Face masks
Face mask work by preventing the air droplets that are produced from coughing from
traveling in the air and being able to prevent people from getting infected. Although they
don’t completely stop all the air droplets they do help to reduce the total amount being
produced. In May 2020, an experiment was conducted to try to prove if using a face mask did
have an effect on reducing the spread of air droplets and it was stated that hundreds of
droplets that were sized between 20 – 500µms. These droplets were stopped mostly by the
face mask with only few getting past. Only recently was it when we saw a huge spike in the
amount face masks being used, this was due to the result of the rapid spread of COVID-19.
For the usage of face masks to be as effective as possible, the entire community needs to
comply with using them. If people don’t comply, the ones that are infected and not wearing
face masks could still run the risk of infecting others and increasing the rate of spread
generally. However, when trying to send these around to the general public, it would take
lots of time and money. When the COVID-19 infection broke out, there was a shortage of
face masks, resulting in many people not having access to them and the health care workers
being prioritised. Additionally, it would also be very hard to try to roll out face masks out to
poor third world countries, it would cost too much money simply to role out the face masks
and the money could be better invested into trying to find a cure or effective vaccine to
combat the disease. Furthermore, due to many people having a lack of care for the
environment, people may just end up not disposing of their masks in a suitable manner and
just throw their masks on the floor in a public area, not only is the bad for the environment
but an infectious pathogen could still be on the face mask. According to the centres for
disease control and prevention, they have stated that germs on dry surfaces can live on for
“days or even weeks.”. This means that someone could end up coming into contact with the
face mask and potentially catch the infectious pathogen becoming infected. Using face
masks will also result in side effects such as headaches and skin breakdown, an example of
this could be a study that was conducted in the USA, where hundreds of healthcare workers
explained what happened to them when they wore face masks and they complained of
getting headaches due to the face covering making breathing difficult and their skin starting
to flake off, even though this is due to long usage of face masks, it goes to show that face
masks still can affect the person wearing them. People who have breathing difficulties also
tend not to wear face masks (e.g. people with asthma), this meant that they could still receive
, and transmit the infectious diseases reducing the effectiveness of face masks. Overall, I do
believe the usage of face masks would work very well in theory, the help to prevent the
spread of air droplets radically, they are simple to use and useful for everyone as long as they
wear a face mask. But what I’ve seen in practise, hasn’t been as effective as planned, many
people disregard face covering as they believe they don’t work nor will it actually protect
them from COVID-19. This resulted in many people still catching and spreading the disease.
The demand for face covering was also very high making it hard for people to actually get
one, with healthcare works having to be prioritised, the general public may not have access
to them, resulting in people being able to catch the disease. Altogether, I believe that face
masks efficiency is reflected upon the compliancy of the general public, if everyone were to
comply with face coverings, the effectiveness of face masks would be immensely high and
would help to reduce the spread and transmission of infectious diseases.
Gloves
Gloves work to prevent the spread and transmission of diseases by creating a barrier between
the germs and the hands. This can be things such as blood, bodily fluids and objects that
could be contaminated. This will then help to stop those diseases from getting into the body
through points of the body such as the mouth, nose and eyes. Like face masks, gloves have
also seen a huge surge of COVID_19 cases, but they are also standardly used in the medical
context to prevent any infection spreading to the healthcare works but also reducing the risk
of any infection occurring to patients who may have undergone surgery (e.g. open-heart
surgery). These most often are used within industry and medicine, rarely do people use them
in the general public. Using gloves are most effective by keeping good hygiene, if gloves were
worn without good handwashing taking place, infectious microbes could still be on the hand
and could result in someone getting infected from that. Personally myself, I think using
gloves on their own are not effective and to achieve maximum efficiency they would have to
be used in conjunction with another preventative measure (e.g. hand washing). Similarly, to
face masks, gloves would take too much time and money to give out to everyone in the
world, especially in third world countries. This is why the promotion of regular hand
washing was put in place because it is just as effective as preventing the spread of diseases.
Wearing gloves can also cause side effects if worn for too long, due to the exposure to latex
which due to its natural latex proteins can cause a person to experience itchiness and hives,
although people who wear gloves may put on protective cream before wearing the gloves to
reduce the chance of that happening along with some powder to make it more comfortable.
Environmentally, just like face masks, many people may just throw them onto the floor in a
public road, not only will this cause damage to the environment due to littering but that the
gloves could contain an infectious pathogen on them and someone may touch or pick the
glove up, resulting in them being infected with the pathogen. The efficiency of wearing
gloves in the general public is unknown, however in the healthcare industry, they are
valuable as the help to protect both the healthcare worker and patient from the risk of
infection. Overall, I would say that the usage of gloves is mildly effective, however can be
severely improved if used with another preventative transmission method. General
