I was president of the IET for 2016-17, and have been asked by government to gather practical and innovative ideas from our Engineering communities. So, please enter any ideas you might have in this thread that might help address and mitigate the Covid-19 crisis. Ideas might include digital tracking / monitoring through therapy equipment and beyond. Even ideas outside your usual expertise domain will be welcome. Now’s the time for Engineering to show we can change the world!
Kenneth Hattersley: (It would be nice if you included something about yourself) Re the possibility of using ozone to sterilise masks and face guards.
The ozone generators I illustrate are commercial equipment designed primarily for freshening rooms ... But they are ozone generators, and the OC1500 produces enough to be hazardous to people. These are not medically rated or calibrated, but my belief is that in a closed space these should be capable of producing enough ozone to be effective ... But confirming that would have to be established in a trial including the ambulance and medical people. But by re-purposing off-the-shelf equipment a trial could be done in days, and if successful deployed widely within a couple of weeks ... very much the timescale that COVID-19 needs. Which is why the Ambulance trial is so important, and will remain my focus.
However, whilst masks, visors and gowns would seem very simple problem by comparison to ambulances, I think this is not the case! The mask/visors/gowns to be processed must be considered to have been contaminated, and thus will have to have been cleaned enough to be guaranteed contamination free when pressed against a healthy person for protracted time. This is a very stringent requirement for once-used materials; though easily met with new materials!
To use an ozone technique. The used masks/visors/gowns would have to be assessed, folded, batched, loaded into the equipment then subjected to the ozone; then it must be packaged for transport to users, without getting cross-contamination from the untreated material coming in. These are all complex steps and thus slow and expensive. I suggest a more effective approach can be found in the food industry. Food Irradiation Technology (https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/food-irradiation-what-you-need-know), which has apparently been in use in the food industry for many years. I also understand it is in use in sterilisation of medical equipment. In this approach, masks/visors/gowns could be assessed, assembled in bundles and then shrink-wrapped! Then the complete package would be irradiated, and when the process is complete the shrink-wrap packaging maintains the biological integrity until it reaches the point of use.
Returning to the Ambulance: The interior only needs to be as clean (or cleaner) than it would be if it were wiped with antiseptic wipes ... good but not perfect. It is an infection control process, managing the levels of viruses to the point at which the risk of a patient catching something is low enough to make the ambulance journey acceptable.
Kenneth Hattersley: (It would be nice if you included something about yourself) Re the possibility of using ozone to sterilise masks and face guards.
The ozone generators I illustrate are commercial equipment designed primarily for freshening rooms ... But they are ozone generators, and the OC1500 produces enough to be hazardous to people. These are not medically rated or calibrated, but my belief is that in a closed space these should be capable of producing enough ozone to be effective ... But confirming that would have to be established in a trial including the ambulance and medical people. But by re-purposing off-the-shelf equipment a trial could be done in days, and if successful deployed widely within a couple of weeks ... very much the timescale that COVID-19 needs. Which is why the Ambulance trial is so important, and will remain my focus.
However, whilst masks, visors and gowns would seem very simple problem by comparison to ambulances, I think this is not the case! The mask/visors/gowns to be processed must be considered to have been contaminated, and thus will have to have been cleaned enough to be guaranteed contamination free when pressed against a healthy person for protracted time. This is a very stringent requirement for once-used materials; though easily met with new materials!
To use an ozone technique. The used masks/visors/gowns would have to be assessed, folded, batched, loaded into the equipment then subjected to the ozone; then it must be packaged for transport to users, without getting cross-contamination from the untreated material coming in. These are all complex steps and thus slow and expensive. I suggest a more effective approach can be found in the food industry. Food Irradiation Technology (https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/food-irradiation-what-you-need-know), which has apparently been in use in the food industry for many years. I also understand it is in use in sterilisation of medical equipment. In this approach, masks/visors/gowns could be assessed, assembled in bundles and then shrink-wrapped! Then the complete package would be irradiated, and when the process is complete the shrink-wrap packaging maintains the biological integrity until it reaches the point of use.
Returning to the Ambulance: The interior only needs to be as clean (or cleaner) than it would be if it were wiped with antiseptic wipes ... good but not perfect. It is an infection control process, managing the levels of viruses to the point at which the risk of a patient catching something is low enough to make the ambulance journey acceptable.
