Background
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The Athens 2004 summer Olympic and Para Olympic games, was the largest sport event ever held in Greece, and involved a large number of athletes and spectators gathered in the greater metropolitan area of Athens and four other Olympic Cities. Protecting the health of the athletes, officials, spectators and the population of Athens during the Olympic games, was one of the top priorities of the public health professionals and the Greek government itself. The Ministry of Health and Social Solidarity, as early as three years prior to the games had assigned the different tasks for public health preparation to the appropriate agencies. The National School of Public Health in Athens, in cooperation with the Greek Ministry of Health, put together a team of public health professionals in ordernetwork of public health professionals from the office of environmental health at the Ministry of Health, the office of medical services from the Athens 2004 Olympic Games Organizing Committee and all county departments of public health responsible to oversee inspection programs in municipalities hosting Olympic events.

Olympic county departments of public health
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The vast majority of Olympic events were scheduled to take place in the metropolitan area of Athens, which included four sections of the municipality of Athens (central, east, west and south), the municipalities of East and West Attica, and the municipality of Piraeus with its main port. Additional counties hosting Olympic events included the metropolitan area of Thessalonica with its second largest port in the north of the country (the second largest city of Greece), the metropolitan area