You have learned quite a lot about communicable diseases. In this activity, you will learn about some of the things to do to prevent yourself from becoming sick.  

Many advances have been made to help prevent the spread of communicable diseases. You cannot necessarily tell by looking at someone if they have a communicable disease, but you can use reasonable precautions to protect your health at all times:

• Keep your immunizations up to date. Vaccines are available to protect against many communicable diseases, including polio, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis (also called whooping cough), haemophilus influenza B, measles, mumps, rubella (also called German measles), Hepatitis B, and varicella (also called chicken pox).

• Take tests available for tuberculosis (TB). This is very helpful for children and people who work with children because TB can be treated successfully with antibiotics if you are aware you have the illness.

• Protect yourself from the spread of infectious diseases by practising good hygiene. That means you need to remember the various ways diseases can spread and protect yourself from them.

Some very important practices to maintain include these:

• Wash your hands carefully with warm, soapy water before and after preparing food, eating, drinking, or taking medication.

• Wash your hands after working or playing outdoors, handling animals, using the washroom, changing diapers, touching any bodily fluids such as when cleaning a cut or wiping your nose, or using chemicals for cleaning.

• If your work environment requires you to deal with blood or bodily fluids, be sure to wear latex gloves to protect your skin from contact with those fluids.

• Keep it clean! Be sure that kitchen and bathroom surfaces are cleaned regularly with soap and water and then disinfected with bleach or other disinfectants.

• Handle food carefully. Remember what you learned about safe ways to handle food: Cook food thoroughly and to temperatures that are high enough to kill bacteria; refrigerate cold foods; throw away food that has not been stored safely.

• Get some fresh air. Spend time outside and let fresh air into your home to keep your air clean.

• Sneeze and cough into a tissue or your shoulder or upper arm. If you have a cold, wash your hands frequently to prevent "passing it on." If you sneeze or cough into your hands, wash them!

• Never share personal hygiene items such as toothbrushes and combs.

Although you cannot guarantee that you will never get sick, you can do a lot to protect yourself from preventable illnesses!