COVID 19 or Coronavirus Disease 19 was announced by World Health Organization (WHO) as pandemic. This is caused by the pathogen SARS-COV 2, a virus from the Coronaviridae family. This is a type of virus that affects the lower respiratory tract and manifests as pneumonia in humans (Sohrabi et al., 2020) . Despite rigorous containment and quarantine efforts , the incidence of COVID-19 continues to rise with 1,018,948 laboratory-confirmed cases with over 50,000 deaths worldwide. Currently, there is no available drug or vaccine against COVID 19. Proper hygiene and disinfection are available means we can maximize to prevent this disease. Thus, to avoid spread of COVID-19, this article was made to give us basic understanding of disinfection.
What is disinfection?
According to Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), disinfection describes a process that eliminates many or all pathogenic microorganisms, except bacterial spores, on inanimate objects (CDC,2008). There are many factors that affect the efficacy of disinfection. These include the following: prior cleaning of the object; organic and inorganic load present; type and level of microbial contamination; concentration of and exposure time to the germicide; physical nature of the object; presence of biofilm; and the temperature and pH of the disinfection process. Commonly used disinfectants are the alcohols, chlorine-based compounds hydrogen peroxide, aldehydes, iodophors, peracetic acid, phenolics and the quaternary ammonium compounds.
Why do we need to disinfect?
The effective use of disinfectants is part of a multi-barrier strategy to prevent health-care–associated infections. Although it is already a cliché, but still “prevention is better than cure.”
Who needs to know the basic of disinfection?
The basic answer to that question is everybody. Everyone must be aware on the importance of disinfection not only those who are working in hospitals or in the business of cleaning/ janitorial services. The more we know, the more we will value and understand the proper disinfection as prevention to any illnesses. Especially this season, the COVID 19 crisis is being felt by everyone. Proper hygiene in this time of crisis is necessary to maintain good health.
When and where to disinfect?
Most of the pathogens are persistent and can thrive on the surface for several months if no intervention was done. In deciding where to disinfect, we must follow the proper guidelines recommended by governmental, regulatory and infection control team. Common sense dictates the “touch point” or areas frequently touched must be routinely disinfected.
How to disinfect?
There are two methods of applying disinfectant. You can do the surface spray disinfection and the space spray disinfection. Surface spray disinfection is the application of the disinfectant on the surface of an object. It can be on floors, walls, tables, chairs etc. Equipment usually used for this are the knapsack sprayer, handheld sprayer or the compression sprayer. Surface disinfection also includes mopping and wiping the surface. However, through surface spray spraying, pathogens that are airborne cannot be killed. That’s why we use the space spray disinfection. Space spray – technically a fog (sometimes referred to as an aerosol) –is a liquid solution dispersed into the air in the form of hundreds of millions of tiny droplets less than 50 μm in diameter. It is only effective while the droplets remain airborne. Space sprays are applied mainly as thermal fogs or cold fogs (WHOPES, 2003). In this method, the appropriate equipment is the misting machine or mist blower. It is type of machine which releases the fine particles, suspend on the air for several minutes and drops to the surface. Then, you can now wipe or mop the liquid droplets.
References:
- Sohrabi C, Alsafi Z, O’Neill N, Khan M, Kerwan A, Al-Jabir A, Iosifidis C, Agha R. 2020. World Health Organization declares global emergency: A review of the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19). International Journal of Surgery 76 (2020) 71–76.
- Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).2008. Guideline for Disinfection and Sterilization in Healthcare Facilities .Retrieved 3 April 2020 from https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/disinfection/
- WHO Pesticide Evaluation Scheme (WHOPES ). 2003. Space Spray Application of insecticides for vector and public health pest control: A practitioner;s guide. Geneva, World Health Organization. Retrieved 3 April 2020 from https://www.who.int/whopes/resources/who_cds_whopes_gcdpp_2003.5/en/
