Measuring the Risk of Infection at Work

Abstract

The authors descr. methods and new formulae for assessing risk of tuberculosis infection at work, and make suggestion for the most efficient use of mass radiography which they consider vital in its prevention. They find a definite association between risk of tuberculosis and numbers of persons working together, though not between risk and "overcrowding." They suggest that risk bears a curvilinear relation to number of contacts and from this they reason that though acquired specific resistance is higher in young adults than in children, the rising incidence of tuberculosis at young adult ages in industry is not surprising. They think that excess of tuberculosis in the industry examined is neither a specific occupational hazard, a result of bad conditions, nor an example of sub-average powers of resistance: and they suggest that "any given percentage of active cases of tuberculosis in a light industry constitutes a greater danger to fellow-workers than the same percentage in a heavy industry".