Hi,

I am curious. How dangerous is to work with Bordetella pertussis?
For example, I am very careful and most of the work is under the hood (except for centrifugation and spectrophotometry). But then, I need to take a small quantity of cell dispersion and carry it through the lab on a glass slide for microscopy. Is there any possibility that bacteria go into air or otherwise endanger me?

Thank you.

This is probably not the place to get safety information about infectious agents. There should be safety protocols as part of your lab/centre/university for dealing with these bacteria. Alternatively, asking your supervisor or centres safety officer is probably a better idea.

There should have been a discussion before any work started to sort out what the risks were and what could be done about them

For example, I'm sure there's a vaccine against whooping cough.

Wouldn't it have been a lot better to get that jab first?

Vaccine has been done, but it is not a 100% prevention of having or transmitting it...

I am careful and I follow protocols, I just wanted to hear if anyone had experience with this bacteria etc.

Work with Bordetalla pertussis follows standard BSL2 protocols. While it is highly infectious, there are treatment options. Technically, event at BSL1 theoretically you should not come into contact with the agents. BSL2 adds a few extra layers of caution. The biggest risk is typically complacency as no protocol in the world can replace situational awareness, knowledge of workflow and common sense.

 

For your specific question, typically you should prepare your slides under aerosol-controlled conditions, and treat it as infectious material subsequently. You should ask your safety officer, and request the rulings on it. However, you can always protect yourself more than asked for. It is your health, after all. If e.g. the protocol does not ask for sealing of the slides, depending on what you intend to do, you may still do it. Or, even if your instructions does not tell you disinfect the slide holder, you may still want to do it even if you have not made a spill (but keep solutions away from the optical parts).

 

Remember that material only gets airborne if you somehow cause aerosols or turbulence. So, minimize it and be aware e.g. of areas where you have drafts (such as vents and doors with pressure differentials as commonly found in BSL2 labs). If you move through those areas, you must have your samples closed off, for example.

 

And additional part of this is also self-monitoring, in case you develop cold symptoms, for example. Much of that should be covered in your respective safety protocols, but again, use common sense on top. These manual are rarely exhaustive.