Ok, this could be a bit wild and wacky but diseases and biology is not my dept.
If everyone with a cold or flu was to place themselves in a semi (voluntary/home) quarantine, wouldn't the common cold be eradicated ventually?
Employers currently insist on workers with colds to attend work, which generally means several other peole catch it.
So, there's either a perpetual cold going round until immunity is developed or people are off sick.
Someone I know who works in the food industry felt obliged to work with a heavy cold, finally took a day off and was ostracised on his return cos people decided he was skiving. His legal responsibility is to stay away while ill but his company disagreed.
If someone made a stand and said let sick people who have contagious diseases go home and STAY home, maybe we could wipe it out.
I am aware that contagion happens at home too.
Although thorough handwashing, clinical style, reduces contagion enormously.
And what's with buses? Every time I get on a bus some idiot sneezes or coughs, doesn't cover the nose or mouth, gives half the other people on the bus some grotty germs and isn't there to see the result.
If quarantine was introduced, employers would probably lose out on man hours over, say 5 years, of people being off sick with colds. But, the overall effect of the five years could mean that no one would ever have time off with a cold ever again after that. Same with flu, tonsilitis (maybe?) and other air/physically borne germs.
Furthermore, (on my high horse now :blush:) parents rarely seem to teach kids handwashing, the amount of kids I know who come out of loos with dry hands, unwashed, is disgraceful and disgusting but the same applies. If they cough into their hands then flush the loo, use a tap, use the door handle, a towel, a cup, a fork etc etc, that's it, the germs are there for the next person to catch.
Remember the stories about what's found on the London Underground... imagine the stuff on the door handles in Meadowhell for example.
So much more could be done but why is it not tackled?
Not into germ warfare and its effects but I'm curious about what others think.

The problem with the cold virus is its' ability to mutate itself.
So although you develop an immunity to one form it can regenerate & reinfect you. It's always gonna be there I'm afraid.

Talking of washing hands...
My personal bug bear is pub toilets.
I can only speak for the GENTS here but the ladies may educate me?

Why do all pub toilet doors open inwards only?
You may be scrupulous about your handwashing but the 500 chavs before you who pee on their fingers & DON'T wash then grab to PULL handle. You are forced to do the same collecting a soup of their willy-germs on your hands. :gag:

Goes well with the cheese & onion crisps later.

Pub doors should open the other way so you can push them out with your foot or something.

your generally infectious before you show any symptoms, diseases have evolved to spread as efficiently as possible.

all doors open inwards, it's so that when leaving a room you don't wack someone who just happened to be passing in the face with a door. Especially applicable in busy pubs i'd have thought.

Originally posted by Don_Kiddick
The problem with the cold virus is its' ability to mutate itself.
So although you develop an immunity to one form it can regenerate & reinfect you. It's always gonna be there I'm afraid.

Talking of washing hands...
My personal bug bear is pub toilets.
I can only speak for the GENTS here but the ladies may educate me?

Why do all pub toilet doors open inwards only?
You may be scrupulous about your handwashing but the 500 chavs before you who pee on their fingers & DON'T wash then grab to PULL handle. You are forced to do the same collecting a soup of their willy-germs on your hands. :gag:

Goes well with the cheese & onion crisps later.

Pub doors should open the other way so you can push them out with your foot or something.

How about we put on a pair of disposable gloves on entry, and chuck them in a medical wate bin outside the loo when we're out? ;)

Seriously, the whole business of negotiating your way out of the loo after washing your hands does make a mockery of washing your hands in the first place.

Star Trek sliding doors?

Or...what about having the urinals and stalls in one room and the you have a door to go through to get to an nopen plan 'brush and wash up' area that is linked to the main rooms of the pub by a little corridor with no doors on it? That way the waste depositing is separated from the food and drink areas by a door but the sinks and such are more continguous with it.

Joe

I think productivity would be much higher if companies encouraged people to stay at home when they don't feel up to it. As it is I actually lose a days pay if I'm off sick, so instead I will come in, do no work, and infect everybody else to the point where they are doing the same thing a few days later.

Originally posted by tslogf74
I think productivity would be much higher if companies encouraged people to stay at home when they don't feel up to it. As it is I actually lose a days pay if I'm off sick, so instead I will come in, do no work, and infect everybody else to the point where they are doing the same thing a few days later.

Got to agree.

I work as a contractor and so lose pay if I don't work anyway, but I'll take time off when I get to the sniffling, runny nose stage. Mainly because by that point my brain is more befuddled than usual and I can't think straight.

I've worked in many places where people come in and apart form infecting the office make stupid errors that cost them and their colleagues time and money to put right. I don't like work place martyrs - they damage MY health and MY productivity.

Enlightened self interest works again!

Joe :)

I don't feel that i'm under pressure to come to work if i'm ill.

If I get a bad cold I'll take a few days off, especially since I stay away in hotels, which is a pretty miserable way to spend an evening if you don't feel well.

Saying that, I seem to have timed most illnesses last year to coincide with holidays, bank holidays and weekends. Just my luck. I think i only had about 3 days off in total.

Originally posted by Zebra
If everyone with a cold or flu was to place themselves in a semi (voluntary/home) quarantine, wouldn't the common cold be eradicated ventually?
what others think.

There'd be a lot of people in your quarantine!

Including me! I always have cold!

Interesting to read everyones replies and such a relief to know that men notice the door systems and the handwashing.
I find few things more revolting than a person who doesn't wash their hands after the loo and then wants to hold hands or pass you something.
There are plenty of women who don't wash their hands too although the majority ard pretty good and women sometimes look at each other in a 'I hope you plan to wash your hands' kinda way.
I am often reluctant to touch the door handles and although women do often have an area suitable for make up and hair doing between the door and the loo area, the door handles still open in.
A friend of mine works in a busy city centre office with a least 30 others in his dept and perhaps another 100 who visit the office every day. They have full air con. He feels obliged to go in when ill as he is quite inportant in his workplace. The air con seems to make things worse and I can honestly say that my friend is ill with greater frequency than anyone I know. Every 2 months at least. This then means most of his office does. So, instead of having a few days off and sorting it out, he might take one while at his worst but then so does half of the rest of the office which ultimately costs more.
Buses are still my bugbear, passengers are trapped in germ infested moving rooms while people rpoject missiles contained diseases at over 100 miles p/h - gruesome!