Coronavirus 'may spread through air con' after 24 bus passengers test positive

[chiltern trev]

Article in the Daily Mirror. Coronavirus 'may spread through air con' after 24 bus passengers test positive. A track n trace exercise went back to one person on a 90 minute ride and 24 test positive - recirculating air con deemed to be the spreading device.

Article also has a picture of a London double decker with windows in that open.

So what proportion and what type of UK buses and coaches might have a similar air con? Or trains?


https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world...p.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sharebar

Coronavirus may be able to spread through air conditioning units after 24 people caught the disease on a bus, scientists have claimed.


The passengers tested positive for Covid-19 on the 90-minute journey in China's Zhejiang Province on January 19, according to reports.



Experts linked the 24 cases back to one passenger on the bus, meaning viral droplets possibly spread through the air conditioning unit.


The unit recirculated the same air, rather than new air from outdoors.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Almost no UK buses have aircon. Coaches yes.

I don't think this is news, though, it's been known for some time.

 

[MikeWM]

Why is something that happened on January 19th speculative 'news' ('may spread') in September? Other than 'keeping the fear going', that is.

 

[bramling]

Why is something that happened on January 19th speculative 'news' ('may spread') in September? Other than 'keeping the fear going', that is.

Does make me laugh that the article in question is illustrated with a non-air-conditioned UK bus.

There could however be some relevance to air-conditioned trains. The industry has been rather tight-lipped about whether air is recirculated.

 

[Bantamzen]

Why is something that happened on January 19th speculative 'news' ('may spread') in September? Other than 'keeping the fear going', that is.

Well we all clicked on the link, soooo.....

 

[MikeWM]

Well we all clicked on the link, soooo.....

I am sufficiently ad-blocked that it probably won't generate any revenue for them. Hopefully, anyway

There could however be some relevance to air-conditioned trains. The industry has been rather tight-lipped about whether air is recirculated.

Let's have the 365s back and then we can open the windows

 

[Islineclear3_1]

I am sufficiently ad-blocked that it probably won't generate any revenue for them. Hopefully, anyway



Let's have the 365s back and then we can open the windows

Bring back the slam door trains with opening drop/toplights...

Surely this design would be more "Covid-Secure" and trump any case for poor crashworthiness

 

[takno]

The key point here is that it was in January in pre-lockdown China. That means that nobody was distancing, nobody had even considered increasing the amount of fresh air in the mix, and nobody was avoiding travelling even if they were very symptomatic.

As an example it's clearly been cherry-picked from thousands of bus journeys that were contact traced with far less noteworthy results. It's also rendered completely invalid if it turns out that actually half a dozen people on the bus already had it, rather than just the one they were contact tracing.

As a transmission vector it seems far more likely that the Aircon was blowing about aerosols rather than droplets anyway, and probably wasn't required to explain a freak high level of infection on a single journey.

more relevant to the rail industry was the large aggregation of many contact traced infections in China, which showed a fairly low risk of infection, falling rapidly the more rows or seats away from the infected person you were. Can't find a link for that just now though unfortunately

 

[edwin_m]

No mention of masks either, presumably nobody was wearing them.

 

[takno]

No mention of masks either, presumably nobody was wearing them.

But a lot of people were on that plane from Xante to Cardiff last week, so presumably they don't make any difference anyway in these environments

 

[aar0]

There could however be some relevance to air-conditioned trains. The industry has been rather tight-lipped about whether air is recirculated.

LNER have said on Twitter that their aircon recirculates for 6 minutes (as in the oldest air will have been in the carriage for 6 minutes)

 

[edwin_m]

But a lot of people were on that plane from Xante to Cardiff last week, so presumably they don't make any difference anyway in these environments

A typical mask stops a proportion of the virus-carrying droplets people are breathing out, but doesn't have much effect on what is breathed in. That's why medical staff wear them during operations where the risk is infecting the patient. So wearing a mask doesn't protect the wearer much, but protects others if the wearer happens to be infected. Therefore if there were a few infected people not wearing masks, there would still be infection even if everybody else was.

(I'm ignoring the type of mask that has a valve, which allows infection to be spread but if properly fitted protects the wearer)

With a combination of mask wearing and low infection rates through a proper track-and-trace system, public transport in the Far East is now pretty safe as far as I can tell.

 

[takno]

A typical mask stops a proportion of the virus-carrying droplets people are breathing out, but doesn't have much effect on what is breathed in. That's why medical staff wear them during operations where the risk is infecting the patient. So wearing a mask doesn't protect the wearer much, but protects others if the wearer happens to be infected. Therefore if there were a few infected people not wearing masks, there would still be infection even if everybody else was.

(I'm ignoring the type of mask that has a valve, which allows infection to be spread but if properly fitted protects the wearer)

With a combination of mask wearing and low infection rates through a proper track-and-trace system, public transport in the Far East is now pretty safe as far as I can tell.

Please, there's a separate thread for the mask stuff. I don't need to read another explanation about why surgeons wear masks from somebody who doesn't get the difference between somebody with a great big hole in them on an operating table and a bus passengers. Public transport in the far East is pretty safe because it was never especially dangerous and infection rates are generally very low now

 

[edwin_m]

Please, there's a separate thread for the mask stuff. I don't need to read another explanation about why surgeons wear masks from somebody who doesn't get the difference between somebody with a great big hole in them on an operating table and a bus passengers. Public transport in the far East is pretty safe because it was never especially dangerous and infection rates are generally very low now

If you didn't need an explanation, why did you make an irrelevant and misleading point about the Zante-Cardiff flight?

I won't respond to your other point because, as you note, this isn't the topic for it.

 

[Gerald Fiennes]

There already is a thread on here about 'Ventilation and Aircon' which has covered some of this.....

 

[Cowley]

There already is a thread on here about 'Ventilation and Aircon' which has covered some of this.....

There is indeed and this seems to be a rather old story, the other thread is here anyway for any further discussions on the subject:

Ventilation and air con

Is anyone familiar with the technical details, design and maintenance of the ventilation systems on different train types? After reading up on this re. a recent air journey (20 changes per hour, air travels downwards towards floor etc) I wonder how that compares with trains. Bearing I'm mind...

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