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Health Hazards in Microbiology

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Handbook of Laboratory Health and Safety Measures

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Abstract

Although there have been problems of health and safety in microbiology laboratories since the days of Pasteur and Koch there was little concern until the 1970s, when a high incidence of hepatitis B was noted among laboratory workers1, there were two incidents involving smallpox laboratories2’3, and some scientists expressed fears about the possible hazards of recombinant DNA research4. As a result there was a renewed interest in the published accounts and surveys of laboratory-acquired infections which revealed that in the previous 50 years there had been nearly 4000 such infections of which about 160 had proved fatal’. Moreover, the routes and modes of such infections and methods for preventing them had been thoroughly investigated and were fully documented6.

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Authors
  1. C. H. Collins
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department für Innere Medizin, Universität Ulm, D-7900, Ulm/Donau, Federal Republic of Germany

    S. B. Pal

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© 1985 MTP Press Limited

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Collins, C.H. (1985). Health Hazards in Microbiology. In: Pal, S.B. (eds) Handbook of Laboratory Health and Safety Measures. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-9363-7_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-9363-7_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-9365-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-010-9363-7

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