Environmental contamination and personal protective equipment contamination with SARS-CoV-2 virus in a real-life clinical setting

Abstract

The importance of SARS-CoV-2 transmission via contact routes and its stability on surfaces is becoming increasingly recognised. There is ongoing concern that patients can become infected through person-to-person spread and environment-to-person spread. This study assessed whether SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA can be detected in the environment either on staff members’ personal protective equipment (PPE), on high-touch surfaces or around the bedspace of COVID-19–positive patients in a range of different ward settings to evaluate if there was any contamination of these. Results showed all PPE and high-touch surface swabs were negative. All swabs taken in the negative-pressure room where aerosol-generating procedures (AGPs) were being undertaken detected viral RNA (5/5 positive), whereas there was minimal contamination in the intensive therapy unit (1/5 positive) and none detected in the cohort bay. These findings would be consistent with the understanding that areas where AGPs are regularly performed are at higher risk of environmental contamination.

More information

Identifiers

Catalogue record

Export record

ASCII CitationAtomBibTeXData Cite XMLDublin CoreDublin CoreEP3 XMLEndNoteHTML CitationHTML CitationHTML ListJSONMETSMODSMPEG-21 DIDLOpenURL ContextObjectOpenURL ContextObject in SpanRDF+N-TriplesRDF+N3RDF+XMLRIOXX2 XMLReferReference ManagerSimple Metadata

Altmetrics