Disinfectors

Disinfectors, persons who perform disinfection techniques. Disinfectors must receive special theoretical and practical training in schools or courses; according to their qualifications, disinfectors are divided into ordinary disinfectors and instructor-disinfectors. Instructor-disinfectors perform the same work as disinfectors, while also supervising the work of their colleagues. In essence of the work performed, disinfectors should be classified as skilled workers. Instructor-disinfectors, by their qualifications and as supervisors of work, can be classified as belonging to the middle medical-sanitary group of workers. The work of disinfectors and requirements for them are determined by 1) the variety of environments subject to the disinfection process and the responsibility for damage to disinfected property; 2) the nature of the disinfectors' labor itself. The nature of work, considered heavy and harmful, dictates the necessity of having physically healthy people of middle age as disinfectors. The training of the first cadres of qualified disinfectors began at the initiative of Professor Flügge in Germany, where the Dresden school of disinfectors is considered the most organized and well-equipped. In Russia, during the pre-war era, insufficient attention was paid to the issue of school training for workers in disinfection; disinfection vacancies were filled by persons偶然 in disinfection work, who acquired practical skills only in the process of performing current disinfection work. Only under wartime conditions, which created a mass demand for disinfectors, did the organization of short-term (monthly) courses for training disinfectors begin. During the military period, the Moscow sanitary organization conducted ten series of such courses. Persons of both sexes with general education at the elementary school level were admitted to the courses. Teaching at the courses was conducted by sanitary physicians according to a special program (basics of anatomy with physiology, chemistry and physics, epidemiology, chemistry of disinfection agents, disinfection apparatus, disinfection chambers, types of vapor generators, technique of residential and chamber disinfection work, disinsection, deodorization, deratization, disinfection during epizootics, disinfection of transport vehicles, general organization and management of disinfection work). Practical training included familiarizing the cadets with the chamber and residential disinfection work of Moscow. Similar short-term courses were also organized in other cities during the military period; most of them ceased to exist after the war. One of the first permanent schools for disinfectors in the USSR was established in 1921 by the Health Department of the Leningrad Gubispolkom at the Barracks Hospital named after S.P. Botkin (it produced 4 classes of disinfectors and then ceased its activities); in 1926, Mosprofobrom organized 1.5-year courses for disinfectors; now at the initiative of NKZdr. Mosprofobrom, a disinfection department has been organized at the Moscow Medical Technical School, designed for a 2-year course of study, with admission of persons who have completed seven years of education (on the same general basis as for admission to medical technical schools). The military department forms cadres of disinfectors for its purposes from literate Red Army soldiers, who are sent for training to 3-month courses organized at the Military Medical Academy and large (district-scale) hospitals (disinfectors receive a certificate upon completion of the courses). Ten years of experience studying the labor of disinfectors in the Leningrad disinfection-repair brigade and other organizations led to the conclusion that the labor of disinfectors is not only physically heavy but also harmful to health, as the worker's organism is systematically gradually poisoned by small doses of disinfection agents (sublimate, phenol, cresol, etc.). The severity and harmfulness of the labor have been established experimentally (Okunevsky, Vulfovsky). The nature of the labor obliges providing disinfectors with appropriate production and special clothing, protective devices and instruments.