Abstract

VICENTE HERRERO, Mª Teofila; RAMIREZ INIGUEZ DE LA TORRE, Mª Victoria  and  RUEDA GARRIDO, Juan Carlos. Vulnerability criteria for Covid-19 infection in workers. Rev Asoc Esp Espec Med Trab [online]. 2020, vol.29, n.2, pp.12-22.  Epub Oct 19, 2020. ISSN 3020-1160.

COVID-19 disease, which emerged in Wuhan, China and spread worldwide, is a highly contagious viral infection caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. There is a growing interest in the field of public health in identifying prognostic factors, both clinical and paraclinical, that allow the risk of patients to be stratified and, within these factors, it is necessary to consider sociodemographic, clinical and occupational variables.

In the work environment, it is important to highlight the worker’s vulnerability to infection, that is, the probability of being affected by the virus with a higher than normal risk and with more serious consequences, either as a result of greater susceptibility to the effects of the virus, or because of a higher than average level of exposure.

The World Health Organization encourages us to think innovatively, and health promotion and risk prevention can lead this activity within the public health field, obtaining accurate and timely information to prepare and reduce risk in affected individuals, their families and their community.

Given the complexity of this issue and the different aspects that have to be taken into account to qualify a worker as vulnerable to this pandemic infection, it is considered useful to include in the assessment: personal aspects of the person working, previous illnesses and their degree of control, labour aspects and the preventive management options of the companies.

The result of this combination of factors will allow us to quantify individual vulnerability and guide subsequent preventive actions in the world of work.

Keywords : COVID-19; Vulnerability; Occupational Health; Occupational medicine.

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