Coronavirus
Information.
One aspect that has been unclear is exactly how long Sars-CoV-2, the
name of the virus that causes the disease Covid-19, can survive outside the
human body. Some studies on other
coronaviruses, including Sars and Mers, found they can survive
on metal, glass and plastic for as long as nine days, unless they are
properly disinfected. Some can even hang around for up to 28 days in low
temperatures.
Their study, which has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, shows that the virus could survive in
droplets for up to three
hours after being coughed out into the air. Fine droplets between 1-5
micrometres in size – about 30 times smaller than the width of a human hair –
can remain airborne for several hours in still air.
It means that the virus circulating in unfiltered air conditioning
systems will only persist for a couple of hours at the most, especially as
aerosol droplets tend to settle on surfaces faster in disturbed air.
But the NIH
study found that the Sars-CoV-2 virus survives for longer on cardboard – up to
24 hours – and up to 2-3 days on plastic and stainless-steel surfaces.
No comments:
Post a Comment