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As we write this editorial, the world is waiting anxiously to find out whether the current SARS-CoV-2 (etiologic agent of coronavirus disease 2019; COVID19) epidemic will be contained or burgeon into a pandemic. By the time you read this editorial, perhaps the answer will be known. We would like to emphasize at the outset that this editorial represents the opinions of the authors at the time it was written when there is much still unknown about COVID-19. Readers are urged to utilize multiple sources of information including those offered by various professional organizations and government agencies, and to carefully consider differing opinions. Previous outbreaks of novel coronavirus infection (i.e., SARS, MERS) spread less widely than COVID-19 but had a higher mortality rate. The current mortality rate of COVID-19 appears to be approximately 2 to 3%, while the mortality rate during the 2003 SARS epidemic was 10 to 15%. While not wishing to minimize the importance of the risks posed by COVID-19, it is important to remember that the world is constantly awash in infectious diseases, some of which present ongoing significant threats to public health. For example, during 2018 to 2019 in the United States, influenza killed approximately 34,000 people, and during 2017 to 2018, 61,000 people. Healthcare-associated infections in the United States are thought to affect approximately 1.7 million patients annually, resulting in approximately 99,000 deaths. Novel coronavirus outbreaks may be particularly hazardous to healthcare workers. An early report of 138 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 pneumonia from Wuhan, China, found that approximately 40% of cases were presumed hospital-related transmissions, including 40 healthcare workers and 17 patients originally hospitalized for other reasons. A more recent publication from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Beijing, China) reported that as of February 11, 2020, there were 1,716 healthcare workers diagnosed with COVID-19 out of 44,672 confirmed cases, although most of the infected healthcare workers were confined to the initial epicenter of the outbreak (Hubei Province, China). During the 2003 SARS outbreak in Ontario, Canada, 51% of cases were healthcare workers. Healthcare worker involvement with tracheal intubation conferred a 13-fold higher relative risk ratio for acquiring SARS infection when compared to healthcare workers not participating in tracheal intubation. Preventing transmission of infectious diseases to patients and protecting healthcare workers should be a top priority every day, especially but not exclusively during recurring viral epidemics. While anesthesia providers have not traditionally considered themselves to be on the front lines of infection prevention, we have learned in recent years that organisms acquired in the hospital setting can originate from the anesthesia workplace and from the hands of anesthesia providers. In 2018, a writing group of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (Arlington, Virginia) published an expert guidance with recommendations for preventing transmission of pathogens in the anesthesia workplace. The group recognized the difficulty of cleaning the anesthesia workplace, especially the anesthesia machine and the anesthesia cart, in the short time typically allowed for

Preventing Infection of Patients and Healthcare Workers Should Be the New Normal in the Era of Novel Coronavirus Epidemics