Ethical issues in infection control in home care.

The history of infection control is ancient and inextricably bound to the histories of disease, medicine, and nursing. This history reveals the beliefs about the cause of infectious disease through time and the remedies enacted in response. Implicit in this history is an ethical history reflecting the relationship of the infected individual to the group and the power of the state to institute protective measures. In the Middle Ages, for example, a requiem mass or mass for the dead was held for lepers in which the church was draped in black and dirt thrown on the lepers' head. Afterward, they were lead to the leprosaria and given a rattle they were required to use to warn others of their approach.