Is 2019 coronavirus disease airborne? Is WHO revising relevant protection guidelines based on recent academic research on aerosol transmission? The answer is no.
Today, WHO officials said that based on current evidence, 2019 coronavirus disease is spread from person to person primarily through respiratory droplets. Droplet transmission occurs when a person has close contact with a person who has symptoms of a respiratory infection and therefore has access to potentially infectious droplets. Droplet transmission can also occur through contact with surfaces in the environment around an infected person.
Thus, you can become infected if you inhale the virus within 1 meter of a person with 2019 coronavirus disease, or if you touch a contaminated surface before washing your hands and then touching your own eyes, nose, or mouth.
Airborne transmission, on the other hand, is different from droplet transmission. These particles come from larger droplets that evaporate or are present on dust particles. They may remain airborne for a longer period of time and can spread over a range of distances greater than 1 meter.
For 2019 coronavirus disease, the virus may be airborne in certain environments and during medical operations that can produce aerosols. In an analysis of 75,465 cases of 2019 coronavirus disease in China, no cases of airborne transmission were reported.
To date, several academic papers have addressed the question of whether novel coronaviruses can be detected in the air, aiming to present preliminary evidence that the virus may be airborne. Caution is needed in interpreting these preliminary findings.
The New England Journal of Medicine recently published an article on how long novel coronaviruses can persist in the environment. The team artificially generated viral aerosols under laboratory conditions using a triple-jet Collison nebulizer and a Goldberg drum and observed that the aerosols could remain suspended in the air for a period of time, about 3 hours.
It should be noted that the Goldberg drum is a high-energy device and does not correspond to the general conditions that humans experience when coughing. Moreover, even if the novel coronavirus was found to persist as aerosolized particles for 3 hours under these conditions, the conditions did not correspond to the clinical setting in which the aerosols were generated; in other words, the aerosols in the study were generated by laboratory operations.
Based on the current evidence, WHO retains its original recommendation for droplet and contact isolation for healthcare workers of patients with coronavirus disease 2019, and contact and airborne isolation for aerosol-generating diagnostic procedures.
The WHO recommendations for the public also remain the same, namely:
keep at least 1 meter away from others;
disinfect frequently touched surfaces;
wash hands frequently and thoroughly;
avoid touching the eyes, mouth, and nose with hands.
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