In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, masks, coats and other personal protective equipment (PPE) are missing in the hospitals.
Some do what was previously unthinkable – disinfection and reuse of PPE.
One possibility is ultraviolet (UV) light, which is already used to disinfect patient rooms and operating theaters.
In theory, it could also be used to disinfect PPE, but as Ron Hofmann explains, the devil is in the details: Hofmann is a professor in the construction and mineral engineering department of the Faculty of Applied Sciences & Engineering and an expert in the use of UV treatment in the Drinking and wastewater industry.
He is also the president of the International Ultraviolet Association, which recently published a fact sheet on the role that UV treatment can play in reducing the transmission of the virus.
How is UV disinfection used today? It has been known for more than 100 years that UV light kills microorganisms quite effectively.
These include viruses that resemble the one that causes COVID-19.
It is widely used in wastewater and drinking water treatment and the industry has been very well regulated due to decades of science and practice. The use of UV treatment in medical care is more recent and much research is done there today.
It is often mentioned in connection with superbugs, which are pathogens that have become resistant to conventional antibiotics.
So hospitals already have this technology? Some do, but it’s a mix of different devices: some are stationary lamps and others are mobile or robot-controlled.
In many cases it works very well.
But this application is not as mature as with water …
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