10.3: Prevention of Illness

Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you should be able to:

• Identify five ways illness is transmitted.
• Identify standard precautions to prevent illness.
• Discuss practices to protect children from environmental hazards.

Introduction

Science and experience tell us that infectious diseases, especially gastrointestinal disease, which means vomiting, diarrhea, and respiratory disease are increased among children who are cared for in out-of-home group settings. In addition, such children may be at increased risk for certain other infections that may be transmitted by insects or by body fluids. It's also true that children who are cared for in group out-of-home settings are more likely to experience infectious illnesses that are more severe and more prolonged (although 90% of those infections are mild and self-limited, requiring no special treatment).

But there's good news, too. Infectious illnesses such as pneumonia and influenza, which together were the leading causes of death among U.S. children in the early 20th century, have declined by 99.7 percent. Common childhood illnesses such as diphtheria, whooping cough, measles, mumps, and rubella are rare except in communities where immunization rates are low, and polio is unheard of in our country today.

Although younger children are more susceptible to infectious illness because their immune systems are immature, as they grow older, the incidence of infectious disease decreases as their immune systems mature. Furthermore, children who experience more infectious diseases at an early age in group out-of-home care have a decreasing incidence of infectious diseases as they grow older. In fact, they have fewer infectious illnesses in kindergarten than children who were taken care of exclusively at home. Illness also decreases with years of attendance in out-of-home early care and education settings.

Figure 8.1 – As children get older, they get sick less often.³⁵³

There are negative consequences of childhood illness, including:

• It’s unpleasant to be sick (for children or adults who may also become infected).
• Illnesses that are minor in children can be much more serious for adults and pregnant women.
• Some illnesses have severe effects (and can even be life-threatening).
• There may also be additional childcare costs or lost wages for parents/caregivers of children who must be excluded from group care.
• Overuse of antibiotics in an effort to get children well contributes to antibiotic resistance among common bacteria.

To prevent illness we need to understand the different ways illness is spread, how immunizations protect children, and what universal precautions early care and education program staff can take to prevent the spread of illness.

How Illnesses are Transmitted

Bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites that cause illness can be transmitted in five ways, including through:

1. the respiratory route (nose, sinuses, mouth, throat, and possibly middle ear)
2. the fecal-oral route (organisms that live in our intestines get into our mouths)
3. the direct contact route (with another person's skin (or hair))
4. the bodily fluid route (including blood, urine, vomit, and saliva)
5. the vector-borne route (a living thing, such as fleas, ticks, mosquitos, etc. that can transmit disease)

Figure 8.4 – What it might look like if we could see what a child coughs or sneezes.³⁵⁴ The germs that are in this contaminated cloud of exhalation can wind up on surfaces and hands and be transmitted to others. Staff and children who are able to are encouraged to cough into their sleeves. Covering your mouth with your hand only transfers these germs to your hand.

Pause to Reflect Why is it important to understand how illnesses and diseases are spread?

Universal Precautions to Prevent the Spread of Illness

There are standard practices that prevent, or reduce the risk of, the spread of illness in early care and education programs. These are modeled after practices in health care, where everyone is treated as being potentially infected with something that is contagious. Many illnesses are actually contagious before the infected person is symptomatic, so waiting until you see signs of illness is an ineffective way of preventing its spread. Childcare providers can practice these four things to help control the spread of illness.

1. Regular hand washing
   • Before eating, feeding, or preparing food.
   • After touching saliva, mucus, bodily fluids, food, or animals.
   • When visibly dirty, after touching garbage, or after cleaning.
2. Use of disposable nonporous gloves when working with bodily fluids
3. Disinfecting potentially contaminated surfaces
4. Proper disposal of potentially contaminated waste³⁷³

Resources for Further Exploration Health and Safety in the Child Care Setting: Prevention of Infectious Disease A Curriculum for the Training of Child Care Providers (3^rd edition) Safe and Healthy Child Care Centers Handwashing Vaccines Environmental Health in Child Care Air Quality Mold Remediation in Schools Integrated Pest Management in Child Care Centers EPA’s 3TsWater Quality Tool Kit

References

This page was from 7: Promoting Good Health and Wellness by Paris. in Paris, J. (2021). Health, safety and nutrition. LibreTexts.

For references according to subscript, please see pages 165-190 and 207-213 of the original Health, Safety and Nutrition book (Paris, 2021) on Google Drive.