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ISLAM AND PUBLIC HEALTH
Islam’s many public health-related tenets include frequent washing of hands and other parts of the body (done before daily prayers); infectious disease control (including quarantine of cities experiencing an epidemic and a prohibition on traveling from an infected city); dietary guidance that counsels against overindulgence and the consumption of pork (which can carry the Trichinella parasite); proper ways to feed and slaughter animals to ensure that meat is safe for consumption; avoidance of alcohol and other intoxicants; and sexual abstinence outside of marriage.

Sources: Islam by Vartan Gregorian (Brookings Institution Press, 2003); National Geographic Magazine; Encyclopedia Britannica