WHO considers 'airborne precautions' for medical staff after study shows COVID-19 can survive in air

[LiberalArkie]

The World Health Organization is considering “airborne precautions” for medical staff after a new study showed the coronavirus can survive in the air in some settings.

“As you know this is a virus that’s transmitted through droplets, so these are little pieces of liquid,” Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of WHO’s emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, told reporters during a virtual press conference on Monday. “When you do an aerosol-generating procedure like in a medical care facility, you have the possibility to what we call aerosolize these particles, which means they can stay in the air a little bit longer.”

She added: “it’s very important that healthcare workers take additional precautions when they’re working on patients and doing those procedures.”

World health officials say the respiratory disease spreads through human-to-human contact, droplets carried through sneezing and coughing and germs left on inanimate objects.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/16/who-considers-airborne-precautions-for-medical-staff-after-study-shows-coronavirus-can-survive-in-air.html

[Jarqui]

1. I do not understand why it cannot be carried in the droplets when

one who is infected and showing no symptoms merely exhales. Neither does my doctor.

[hlthe2b]

2. Sneezing and coughing propels those droplets. Asymptomatic, yet infected, who are not coughing

or sneezing would not be expelling these droplets withforce, but that doesn't mean zero risk upon close contact.

[Jarqui]

4. Put a mirror up to your mouth and exhale

Water droplets from your breath condensate on the colder mirror.

You are not coughing but moist droplets are coming out as you exhale.

Those droplets can contain virion containing the virus according to my doctor.

So you're walking behind an infected person without symptoms in a store. They exhale. You coming along behind them, inhale. Because their breath is warm, it helps reduce the drop of the heavier moist air. If you inhale their droplets, in theory, you are getting some of their virions ...

There is an article I read recently that claims people with the virus but without symptoms appear to be more infectious than people who are infected with symptoms. If they have no symptoms, they're not coughing or sneezing. A number of anecdotes of infection suggest that touching is not the only way this virus is getting transmitted.

It may be that they're not saying much about it because the run of masks would prevent medical people from getting them.

[hlthe2b]

5. Yes. as I said, the only real difference is the propulsion of those actively coughing & sneezing.

Whether the asymptomatic are carrying lower infectious doses remains controversial, but it seems that they very much are sufficiently infectious.

[SWBTATTReg]

3. Wonder if you work the dehumidifer in the house, it'll make the air more drier, thus less ...

likely that the pathogens can remain in the air longer?