Standard precautions

Standard precautions

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Preventive measures for COVID-19 disease

Based on current evidence, the COVID-19 virus is transmitted between people through close contact and droplets. Airborne transmission may occur during aerosol generating procedures and support treatments (e.g. tracheal intubation, non-invasive ventilation, tracheotomy, cardiopulmonary resuscitation, manual ventilation before intubation, bronchoscopy) ; thus, WHO recommends airborne precautions for these procedures.

For all, the most effective preventive measures include:

  • maintaining physical distance (a minimum of 1 metre) from other individuals;
  • performing hand hygiene frequently with an alcohol-based hand rub if available and if your hands are not visibly dirty or with soap and water if hands are dirty;
  • avoiding touching your eyes, nose, and mouth;
  • practicing respiratory hygiene by coughing or sneezing into a bent elbow or tissue and then immediately disposing of the tissue;
  • wearing a medical mask if you have respiratory symptoms and performing hand hygiene after disposing of the mask;
  • routine cleaning and disinfection of environmental and other frequently touched surfaces.

In health care settings, the main infection prevention and control (IPC) strategies to prevent or limit COVID-19 transmission include the following:

  1. ensuring triage, early recognition, and source control (isolating suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients);
  2. applying standard precautions for all patients and including diligent hand hygiene;
  3. implementing empiric additional precautions (droplet and contact and, wherever applicable for aerosol-generating procedures and support treatments, airborne precautions) for suspected and confirmed cases of COVID-19;
  4. implementing administrative controls;
  5. using environmental and engineering controls.

Standard precautions are meant to reduce the risk of transmission of bloodborne and other pathogens from both recognized and unrecognized sources. They are the basic level of infection control precautions to be used, as a minimum, in the care of all patients.

 Additional transmission-based precautions are required by health care workers to protect themselves and prevent transmission in the health care setting. Contact and droplets precautions should always be implemented by health workers caring for patients with COVID-19 . Airborne precautions should be applied for aerosol-generating procedures and support treatments.

 Although use of PPE is the most visible control used to prevent the spread of infection, it is only one of the IPC measures and should not be relied on as a primary prevention strategy. In the absence of effective administrative and engineering controls, PPE has limited benefit, as described in WHO’s Infection prevention and control of epidemic- and pandemic-