Eurosurveillance - Volume 4, Issue 3, 01 March 1999

Since the first case of documented seroconversion after a specific occupational exposure to HIV was reported in 1984, national or regional systems for the surveillance of occupationally acquired HIV infection have been developed in many industrialised cou

Health care workers (HCWs) face a serious risk of acquiring bloodborne infections, in particular hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), all of which are associated with significant morbidity and mortality

Two hundred and eighty-six occupational transmissions of HIV had been reported worldwide by the end of 1997. A third of these cases (95), usually associated with seroconversion after a specific occupational exposure, were classified as definite occupation