How infectious are dead bodies?

[Guest guest]

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/html/20050104T190000-0500_72605_OBS_HOW_INFE\

CTIOUS_ARE_DEAD_BODIES_.asp

 

How infectious are dead bodies?

 

Wednesday, January 05, 2005

 

 

Transmission of infection requires the presence of an infectious agent, exposure

to that agent, and a susceptible host. It is, therefore, possible to

characterise the infectious risk from dead bodies following a natural disaster

by considering these elements.

 

The human body is host to many organisms, only some of which are pathogenic.

When the body dies, the environment in which pathogens live can no longer

sustain them. However, this does not happen immediately, and transmission of

infectious agents from a cadaver to a living person may occur.

 

Infectious hazards for individuals who routinely handle cadavers include

tuberculosis, group A streptococcal infection, gastroenteritis, transmissible

spongiform encephalopathies (such as Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease), hepatitis B,

hepatitis C, HIV infection, and possibly meningitis and septicemia (especially

meningococcal). Micro-organisms involved in the decay process (putrefaction) are

not pathogenic.

 

Do victims of natural disasters have these infections when they die? Usually

disaster victims die from trauma, burns, or drowning, and they are no more

likely than the local population to have acute infections (meningitis and

septicemia) or rare diseases (eg Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease).

Instead, where disease is present, it is far more likely to be due to chronic

infections with blood-borne viruses (hepatitis B virus, hepatitis C virus, and

HIV), enteric pathogens, and possibly Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

 

Historically, epidemics resulting in mass casualties have only occurred from a

few diseases, including plague, cholera, typhoid, tuberculosis, anthrax, and

smallpox. As previously noted, such infections are no more likely to be present

in disaster victims than in the general population.

 

Furthermore, although some of these diseases are highly contagious, their

causative agents are unable to survive long in the human body following death.

It is, therefore, unlikely that such epidemics will result from contact with a

cadaver.

 

Indeed, survivors present a much more important reservoir for disease. Where

dead bodies have contaminated water supplies, gastroenteritis has been the most

notable problem, although communities will rarely use a water supply where they

know it to be contaminated by dead bodies.

 

Source: PAHO

 

 

 

 

http://www.blueaction.org

" Better to have one freedom too many than to have one freedom too few. "

http://www.sharedvoice.org/unamerican/