Health care workers’ knowledge of emerging viruses

Summary An emerging virus is one that crosses the barrier of animal species to attack humans and manifests itself in a new or unprecedented way. The objective of this work was to evaluate the perception and knowledge of health personnel at the Gabriel Touré University Hospital on emerging viruses, as the epidemics caused by these viruses are causing havoc in the world, especially in Africa, and therefore deserve special attention from all health actors in order to avoid another intrusion into the countries. This is a prospective and descriptive study carried out in February 2017. The survey concerned 280 permanent healthcare personnel (doctors, pharmacists, nurses, midwives, laboratory technicians, healthcare assistants) and trainees (medical and pharmacy interns) present at the time of the study. This work showed us that only the Dengue virus was less well known, while the symptoms of the diseases, the solutions used to inactivate the virus, the modes of transmission, the preventive and protective measures for most of these viruses were well known by our respondents, and that this knowledge was not linked to age or sex but to profession