Staying Healthy: Preventing Infectious Diseases In ECE Services 6th Edition Now Available

Staying healthy: Preventing infectious diseases in early childhood education and care services - 6th Edition has now been published and available to download.

This resource provides simple and effective ways for education and care services to help limit the spread of infectious diseases.

The sixth edition of Staying healthy combines new evidence and perspectives from the past 10 years to inform the update of the guidelines. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, information on the use of gloves, ventilation, hand hygiene and cleaning practices has been updated to ensure the content is clear and easy to implement in education and care services.

In response to community comments and enquiries received by NHMRC on the fifth edition, fact sheets on symptoms and diseases have been added to the guideline. Both fact sheet format and content have been updated to present clear information about symptoms and conditions for educators and other staff, parents and carers. This includes exclusion recommendations.

The new fact sheets for symptoms:

• Diarrhoea or vomiting 
• Eye discharge
• Fever
• Rash
• Respiratory symptoms.

The new fact sheets for specific conditions are:

• Asthma
• COVID-19
• Human metapneumovirus
• Pneumonia
• Hepatitis E
• Typhoid and Paratyphoid fever
• Shingles
• Trachoma.

Staying healthy is aligned with the NQF Education and Care Services National Law and Education and Care Services National Regulations particularly Chapter 4 – Operational requirements, which outlines the requirements for children’s health and safety (Part 4.2), physical environment (Part 4.3) and policies and procedures (Part 4.7, Division 2).

For more information and to download a copy: Staying Healthy In Childcare