Peracetic acid-based disinfectant is the most appropriate solution for a biological decontamination procedure of responders and healthcare workers in the field environment.

Aims: An effective decontamination procedure of personnel wearing personal protective equipment is required by CBRN responders and healthcare workers when dealing with biological warfare agents or natural outbreaks caused by highly contagious pathogens. This study aimed to identify critical factors affecting the efficacy of peracetic acid (PAA)-based disinfectants and products containing either hydrogen peroxide or sodium hypochlorite under the same conditions.

Methods And Results: The influence of concentration, application (contact) time, erroneous human behaviour, interfering substance, technical assets and weather conditions on disinfection efficacy against Bacillus subtilis spores were assessed in 14 experimental groups.

Decontamination of CBRN units contaminated by highly contagious biological agents.

A decontamination process plays a key role in management of biological incidents. While decontamination of surfaces and buildings located in the hot zone can be usually postponed until an agent is confirmed and an adequate planning phase is established, personnel wearing personal protective equipment must be decontaminated prior to their final exit from the hot zone. Because CBRN units require the shortest possible duration of this procedure, many factors must be considered, including concentration of biological agents, precleaning, disinfectant formulae, its concentration and spectrum of efficacy, contact time, external conditions (temperature, pH, relative humidity, soil load), technical assets used for decontamination, decontaminated surface (compatibility, pores), and staff performance.

[Deaths of people in the mountainous territory of High Tatras].

Authors Poprad, since the establishment of the Department of Forensic Medicine in Poprad in 1991 up to now. As mountainous environment is considered an area above the border of Tatranská magistrálna (a tourist footpath which leads across the High Tatras and partially Western Tatras). The file discusses the causes and mechanisms of death and their causal relationships, shows the nationality, age, gender or place of death of deceased people, amounts of deaths in the months of year and also in the days of week.

A novel approach for phytotoxicity assessment by CCD fluorescence imaging.

Rapidity, cost effectiveness, ecological reliability, and the possibility of the direct interpretation of bioassay results are the main motivations for the development of new approaches in ecotoxicity testing. Color, turbidity, and nutrient content are factors of great importance in phytotoxicity testing of natural samples. Some algal bioassay end points are markedly influenced by such factors or are impossible to estimate in their presence.