Biohazards, Essay Example

Biohazards are considered to be dangerous sources of health hazards that most often than not increase panic in the society. Once agents of biohazards have been identified to be existing in a particular community, it is most often than not that a state of emergency is being raised so as to impose social awareness and further control the situation. Why is the reaction over biohazards this serious? What specific aspects of biohazards should be known to the people to help them avoid the impact of the said elements on their health and the integrity of the entire society’s health status? These questions have been carefully outlined and answered in chapter 26 under the heading “Biohazards”; the following discussion shall present a summary of the major points presented within the said chapter.

The chapter specifically dedicates a section that discusses the different agents and sources of biohazards that have been recorded through history to have affected the living condition of human individuals all over the globe. Among the said agents include bacteria, viruses, fungi, rickettsia, parasites and bloodborne pathogens. These specific agents are usually transmitted from one specie to another making their impact a lot stronger. The occurrence of zoonoses or the transfer of disease from animals to humans often results to a large rate of biohazards being considered to pose greater danger to human hosts. This is the reason why the control over activities that could make such transfer possible has been regulated through government agencies dedicated to health watch operations.

It has been highlighted in the chapter how biohazards become more dangerous when they become infectious. With infections occurring, different symptoms surface which makes it hard for healthcare operators to identify the situation more fully, hence resulting to late treatment. In this case, the condition of health status of the victims are further considered especially if they were infected with a biohazard that cannot be given resolution or one that cannot be cured easily. To make sure that biohazard distribution in a certain human population could be easily controlled, health professionals have created a system of classifying each type of biohazard depending on their characteristics, their symptoms and the end-results that they produce. Class 1 biohazards are noted to be of minimal hazard which means they could be treated and cured if immediately reported for emergency healthcare attention. Class 2 is noted to impose ordinary potential hazard. This means that the severity of the impact of the biohazard depends on how the agent has been passed through and inserted within the host. Class 3 involves the existence of specific special hazard, which means that the case could at some point involve special occurrences of specific symptoms that might not be that easy to detect and treat. Class 4 includes extremely hazardous conditions, which imposes on the victims being highly affected by the hazard and at some point may not have any chances of being fully cured from the infection they may have incurred.

Once the outbreak of a biohazard is identified, a relative course of control is imposed through proper laboratory practice. The ones contaminated by the biohazards are treated under three specific classes of safety cabinets which involves clearing the air around them through sanitation and filtration. This however would involve complete saturation of the population affected by the hazard through quarantine. In line with containment of the situation, the cabinets [as well as the facilities used to impose them] play a great role in controlling the further distribution of the agents involved in the situation.

In times when special cases occur such as that of a specific area being contaminated by the biohazard agent, healthcare professionals often call a “sick building syndrome” emergency. This indicates that the population in a certain building is facing a crucial chance of being afflicted by the disease hence should be contained fully until each of the individuals in the entire population have been cleared off from possible infection and contamination. Relatively, this means that more than 20% of the total population in a building has been afflicted by the disease within a short span of time hence requiring immediate treatment. The Environmental Protection Agency or EPA specifically provided a guided definition on how sick building situations should be dealt with and what specific measures should be considered in relation to dealing with indoor air quality improvement so as to avoid instances of biohazard infection distribution.

In relation to genetic engineering, it is assumed that the improper application of the process could further develop specific biohazards that might be more dangerous than helpful as planned. Hence, to help control the situation EPA releases several guidelines that could evaluate the safety of several genetically engineered products that are released in the market for consumption. To make sure that everything is safe, several agencies in the society are developed to help in controlling the situation. Some of the said agencies include the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Agriculture and other public health inspectors who make sure that products are safe from biohazards before being released for market consumption. Through this, control of the impending dangers of biohazards is established hence protecting more from the deadly effects of the said health hazards.