Bifalgorithm post · Health Education · Indirect person
Environmental Routes
Environmental Routes (Health Education · Indirect person) — "Waterborne infections are particularly common in parts of the world where large numbers of people…
Ideas in this flowchart
- Infections can be transmitted through contaminated water, feces, food, objects, and blood.
- Waterborne infections are especially common where clean drinking water and safe sewage disposal are unavailable.
- Infected urine and feces can wash into lakes and streams, where pathogens multiply and reinfect people.
- Some pathogens, including the bacteria that cause cholera, naturally live in environmental water.
- Fecal-oral infections occur when pathogens from feces enter the mouth and multiply in the gut.
- Unclean hands, dirty utensils, and fecally contaminated food can transmit pathogens to the mouth.
- Flies can transfer pathogens from feces to food on their feet.
- Open defecation and lack of clean water or soap increase hand-to-mouth transmission.
- Diarrheal diseases are often transmitted by the fecal-oral route, while some, such as cholera, are mainly waterborne.
- Foodborne infections result from pathogens originating in food components.
- Examples include pathogenic bacteria in raw meat, eggs, and salad leaves.
- Fomites are non-living objects such as cups, spoons, and door handles that can transmit infection.
- Clothing can act as a fomite; hospital doctors may avoid neckties that could contact patients.
- Medical procedures can transmit bloodborne infections through contaminated blood transfusions.
- Bloodborne pathogens can also spread through shared needles and syringes among people who inject illegal drugs.
