Catatan

This book addresses a contemporary topic of considerable interest and some
controversy in the field of health care—the subject of airborne pathogens.
This book is not about debate, it is a compendium of information from the

literature of science and medicine that is intended to assist medical pro-
fessionals, health care workers, engineers, designers, and infection control

professionals in dealing with hospital-acquired infections and outbreaks
caused by pathogens that may spread by the airborne route as well as by
other routes, these being primarily direct or hand contact and contact with
fomites or contaminated equipment. A great many examples are presented

in these pages that make it clear that airborne inhalation is not the only air-
borne route by which infections may be transmitted. The simple fact that a

number of outdoor environmental spores and bacteria regularly show up
as hospital-acquired or nosocomial infections, and that these pathogens can
routinely be detected in the air, makes it abundantly clear that microbes
may be transported by air currents inside hospitals regardless of whether
they are respiratory diseases or not. Some new concepts are introduced in
this book that may be of some benefit in understanding the complexities
of airborne transmission and airborne transport of nosocomial pathogens.
Foremost among these concepts is the idea that airborne transmission and
fomite transmission are inextricably linked and therefore must be dealt with

together and not separately. That is to say, the management of airborne noso-
comial infections must involve strategies for surface disinfection and hand

disinfection as well as air disinfection.