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Occupational injury in the health care sector in the United States rates among the highest of all industries. Specific to hospital support service workers (e.g., Food & Nutrition, Environmental Services), studies have shown that injury rates for support service workers tend to be among the highest of hospital personnel, and yet there is a shortage of research investigating the safety climate of these workers. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine safety perceptions of support service workers. Surveys were used to measure safety climate leadership factors (per the AHRQ's Survey of Patient Safety Culture) to determine if they are related to individual safety perceptions, as well as ratings of work unit safety. Following established safety climate research, we examined the role of the work environment (e.g., supervisor support and work unit culture) on safety perceptions. We found that both supervisor and organizational safety leadership are positively related to individual safety perceptions and supervisor support. Organizational safety leadership and work unit culture were positively related to work unit safety rating. Our findings demonstrate that the antecedent factors and pathways that promote a positive safety climate among health care providers functions in a similar manner for support service workers. These findings contribute to a better understanding of occupational safety of this understudied work group and provide evidence to hospital administration that developing a strong safety climate among support service workers is not entirely different from what is required to promote a robust safety climate across an organization.

Impact mitigation strategies in sub-Saharan Africa on HIV/AIDS in the education sector involved initially the development of education sector policies. This study traces the policy development initiatives, level of implementation, progress made and existing challenges. The study is based on a close (textual) reading of authoritative literature from United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), World Bank, UNESCO and UNICEF for the last decade on global monitoring of HIV/AIDS and statistical data. Studies on the impact of HIV/AIDS on the education sector in sub-Saharan Africa have been brought into focus and themes have been extracted and synthesised from a comparative perspective to guide the development of this chapter. Across the countries, the education sector HIV/AIDS policies had concurrence with the countries’ national HIV and AIDS policy or guidelines, and conformed to international conventions, national laws, policies, guidelines and regulations. Most of the countries in Sub-Saharan Africa showed a significant decline in HIV prevalence among young women or men and opportunities to improve HIV-prevention knowledge and behaviour still abound. Antiretroviral therapy and other types of treatment have expanded since the early 2000s, but the number of AIDS-related deaths remains high. This chapter fulfils an identified information/resources need and amplifies the progress achieved in the mitigation of the impact of HIV/AIDS on the education sector specifically and humanity in general.

The purpose of the study was to analyse approaches to HIV/AIDS education adopted by the Zambian Ministry of Education (MoE), using a holistic approach and focusing on the Zambian culture. This chapter reports on an explorative qualitative study involving focus group discussions and in-depth interviews with Ministry of Education and Health officials, pupils, students, and members of the community. Qualitative analysis was applied and themes from ecological theory were used to organise and discuss data. At the macro level, there was inadequate implementation of HIV/AIDS education in schools, very few handbooks, textbooks and learners’ reading materials, and no discussion of the Zambian cultural (sexual) practices in relation to HIV/AIDS education. Inadequate laws and policies on HIV/AIDS prevention, poverty, unemployment, lack of job creation, and lack of social security were blamed for the lack of positive sexual behaviour changes. Communities had strong theological and metaphysical beliefs including witchcraft and sex with a widow, a menstruating woman or a woman who had an abortion as possible causes of HIV and incurable diseases being a curse from God. At the individual level, the knowledge of HIV/AIDS was high with radio and television being sources of information. Respondents viewed sexual cultures in communities not to have significantly changed. A majority of respondents did not use condoms; most adults continued having multiple sexual partners and women were submissive in marriages. This chapter is useful to policy makers, teachers, pupils/students, and the community, and in understanding interactions and influences of cultures on HIV/AIDS education and government's role in creating an enabling environment to sustain desirable changes.