HIV and Male Healthcare Workers

At New York's Downstate Medical School, one of the pathology professors delighted in asking students what US persons were (in recent times) most likely to die of smallpox. His answer, hospital laundry workers, was my introduction to health care workers as victims of work-transmitted diseases.

When researching my chapter concerning HIV infected health care workers in Clark, Boardman, Callaghan's "Health Law Practice Guide," I was puzzled by the lack of evidence of widespread transmission of HIV to health care workers. There were a few lawsuits by individuals who claimed to have contracted HIV infection during the course of their duties, but they were relatively uncommon and there were confounding factors: was the appearance of HIV transmitted from a patient, or the result of lifestype exposure?

As noted in Kaisernetwork.org Daily HIV/AIDS Report , the CDC has published a study in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine suggesting that male health care workers face a more than twofold risk of dying from HIV/AIDS related causes, as well as other bloodborne diseases (Hepatitis B and C). Female nurses were at lower risk of dying from HIV - related causes than women who did not work in health care.

So, we are back to the old questions: is it private personal lifestyle or decreased immunity or increased risk of work-related infection which accounts for these findings. Because there are confounding issues, such as workers' compensation insurance payments and employer liability payments which may be at play, it will take a large, well funded and staffed, and deep study to figure this one out.