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Between 2 million and 3 million pilgrims are expected to tour the holy places of Mecca and Medina during the next three days to perform the Hajj, a religious pilgrimage that every Muslim should undertake at least once in his/her lifetime. This represents an enormous organizational challenge related to the provision of healthcare.

More than 30 years after the advent of HIV/AIDS, healthcare workers are still lacking in awareness, education and training about the threat of bloodborne pathogen exposure from needlesticks and other sharps-related injuries. Joining other notable sharps safety and occupational health experts across the country in championing an ongoing safety agenda is Mary Foley, PhD, RN, chairperson of the non-profit organization Safe in Common (SIC). Foley is the director of the Center for Nursing Research and Innovation at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) School of Nursing. A registered nurse for more than 35 years, Foley was one of the first healthcare workers to combat the emerging HIV-AIDS epidemic during her work at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital in San Francisco during the 1980s.

Loyola University Medical Center recently grabbed national headlines when a top official released results of a study that said mandatory flu vaccines for healthcare workers don't produce a "mass exodus" of employees. While sporadic healthcare systems nationwide have fired workers for refusing flu shots, requiring workers to get the vaccine doesn't lead to a rash of employee resignations.

Federal health officials reported last month that antibiotic-resistant bacteria infect at least two million Americans every year, and at least 23,000 die from those infections. This harsh reality of hospital infections means that there is no doubting the importance of their control and prevention. Limiting the spread of infection will require novel infection control strategies. A key element of this strategy is to control the dispersal of microbes via contaminated bed linen, mattresses and other points of close contact with infected individuals (Thilagavathi and Kannaian, 2008).