Infection Control

1.1 Identify the difference between bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites
Viruses
Viruses are the smallest agents of infectious disease. Most viruses are exceedingly small about 20 - 200 nanometers in diameter and essentially round in shape. They consist of little more than a small piece of genetic material surrounded by a thin protein coating. Some viruses are also surrounded by a thin, fatty envelope. Viruses are different from all other infectious microorganisms because they are the only group of microorganisms that cannot replicate outside of a host cell. Because viruses do not eat food - instead they seize materials and energy from host cells by hijacking cellular machinery - some scientists argue that they are more like complex molecules than living creatures. Viruses are known to infect nearly every type of organism on Earth. Some viruses, called bacteriophages, even infect bacteria.
Bacteria
Bacteria are ten to 100 times larger than viruses. They are typically 1 to 3 microns in length and take the shape of a sphere or rod. Most bacteria consist of a ring of DNA surrounded by cellular machinery, all contained within a fatty membrane. They acquire energy from the same essential sources as humans, including sugars, proteins, and fats. Some bacteria live and multiply in the environment while others are adapted to life within human or animal hosts. Some bacteria can double in number every fifteen minutes while others take weeks or months to multiply. Bacteria cause many types of diseases, ranging from mild skin irritation to lethal pneumonia.
Bacteria are living things that are neither plants nor animals, but belong to a group all by themselves. They are very small--individually not more than one single cell--however there are normally millions of them together, for they can multiply really fast. Bacteria are prokaryotes (single cells that do not contain a nucleus).
Every species has a great ability to produce offspring and its population expands until it runs...