Scary reality of hospital infections

How real is the danger of doctors contracting life-threatening diseases at work?
Just ask a government doctor here who was infected with the tuberculosis (TB) bacterium while six months pregnant.
Every day is torture for the mother of two whose anguish has been worsened by worry over the health of her newborn daughter.
The doctor, in her 30s, will only know in nine months if she and her two-week-old baby are out of the woods. In the interim, she is on a course of treatment for the disease while her baby is under prophylactic treatment.
It is learnt that the doctor was placed on a modified form of treatment even before delivery to minimise the danger of infection spreading to the foetus.
The dosage was also carefully monitored so as not to poison the baby.
TB is caused by a bacterium which usually attacks the lungs. It can also attack the kidneys, spine and brain.
It is airborne with symptoms that include coughing with chest pains for a period of two weeks, fever at night and loss of appetite and body weight.
The New Straits Times reported yesterday that only a handful of government hospitals had the equipment to clean the air that patients and doctors breathe.
The lack of air-sterilising equipment in most hospitals is taking a toll on the health of those who work there and exposing patients to the risk of infection.
Last year, at least 25 doctors, nurses and hospital staff working in 11 general hospitals were diagnosed with TB, Health Ministry sources said.
This figure is just a fraction of health workers who may have been infected with other infectious diseases.
Of the country’s 135 hospitals, only three have sufficient air-sterilising equipment, while another three have limited equipment.
Meanwhile, International Regent of the American College of Chest Physician training programme director Datuk Dr Jeyaindran Sinnadurai said the time had come for the ministry to seriously consider setting up Occupational Health Units with occupational health physicians at all hospitals.
Source