Always avoid contact with blood and other bodily fluids. Wear disposable gloves when providing care, particularly if you may come into contact with blood or bodily fluids. Dispose of gloves properly and change gloves when providing care to a new patient. Use needles with safety devices to help prevent needlestick injury and exposure to blood-borne pathogens. A hierarchy of controls can help to prevent environmental and occupational exposures and subsequent diseases. These include: Elimination: Physically remove hazards, including needles that lack a safety device. Additionally, eliminate the use of needle devices whenever safe and effective alternatives are available. Substitution: Replace needles without safety devices with ones that have a safety feature built in. This has been shown to reduce blood-borne diseases transmitted via needlestick injuries. Engineering controls: Isolate people from the hazard by providing sharps containers for workers to immediately place needles in after use, which means putting them within arm's reach of wherever patient treatment occurs, such as in every physician's exam room, every draw station in a medical lab, and every bedside in a hospital ward or wing. Administrative controls: Change the way people work by creating a culture of safety such as avoiding recapping or bending needles that may be contaminated and promptly disposing of used needle devices and other sharps. Personal protective equipment: Protect workers with PPE such as gloves and masks to avoid transmission of blood and other bodily fluids. See also BTSB anti-D scandal Contaminated haemophilia blood products Contaminated blood scandal in the United Kingdom Hematology HIV-tainted blood scandal (Japan) Infected blood scandal (France) Plasma Economy Royal Commission of Inquiry on the Blood System in Canada References External links Selected EPA-registered Disinfectants—U.S. Environmental Protection Agency OSHA Bloodborne Pathogen Standard (BBPS) Bloodborne Pathogens and Needlestick Prevention, from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) OSHA Bloodborne Pathogens Workplace Safety Standards and Regulations OSHA Bloodborne Pathogens Training Antimicrobials Information—National Pesticide Information Center Professor Andrew Speilman, Entomologist, Harvard School of Hygiene and Public Health Freeview Malaria video by the Vega Science Trust. Rob Hutchinson, Entomolgoist, Mosquitoes London School of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases. Freeview video by the Vega Science Trust. NIOSH Bloodborne Infectious Diseases Topic Page Infectious diseases Occupational diseases