Friday, May 29, 2020

SAFETY MEASURES FOR CORONA VIRUS

The Center for Disease Control in the USA has issued a notification on the emerging scientific evidence on coronavirus transmission.

1. VERY LOW RISK of transmission from surfaces.

2. VERY LOW RISK from outdoor activities.

3. VERY HIGH RISK from gathering enclosed spaces like offices, cinema halls, religious places, gyms, and theatres.

4. These findings that have been emerging for a while, need to be applied by people to manage the situation in the best possible manner. Time to reduce panic about surface transmission, and not be too eager to go back to the office.

Q. Who is expected to catch coronavirus? 
Q. What does it take to infect? 

TO SUCCESSFULLY INFECT A PERSON, THE VIRUS NEEDS A DOZE OF - 1000 VIRAL PARTICLES [VP]

The typical environmental spread of activities

>Breath 20 vp/minute

>Speaking 200 vp/minute

>Cough 200 million vp enough of these will remain in the air for hours in a poorly ventilated environment.

FORMULA: SUCCESSFUL INFECTION-[exposure to virus x time.

SCENARIOS:

1. Being in the vicinity of someone [with 6 feet distancing]- low risk if limited to less than 45 minutes.

2. Talking to someone face to face [with mask]-low risk if limited to less than 4 minutes.

3. Someone passing by like walking, jogging, cycling-low risk.

4. Well ventilated spaces with distancing-low risk [limit duration]

5. Grocery shopping- medium risk.[can reduce to low by limiting time and by following hygiene.

6. Indoor spaces-HIGH RISK.

7. Public bathrooms/common areas: HIGH FOMITE/SURFACE TRANSFER RISK.

8. Restaurants: HIGH RISK [can be reduced to medium risk by surface touch awareness]

9. Workplaces, schools [even with social distancing]- VERY HIGH RISK including high fomite transfer risk.

10. Parties/weddings: VERY HIGH RISK.

11. Business networking/conferences: VERY HIGH RISK.

12. Arenas/concerts/cinemas: VERY HIGH RISK.

The bottom line factors you can use to calculate your risks are:

> indoors vs outdoors
> narrow spaces vs large ventilated spaces.
> high people density vs low people density.
> longer exposure vs brief exposure.

the risks will be higher for former scenarios.



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