Sunday 18 October 2020

Halls of Pestilence?

I have pointed out, on several occassions, that the type of accommodation generally provided for undergraduate students at UK universities facilitates viral transmission. The rooms are small, often poorly ventilated (sometimes the windows cannot be opened on 'safety' grounds) and the students are frequently clustered around shared kitchen, sitting and laundry provision. When one student tests positive for Covid-19, the rest of their cluster are generally required to remain in their rooms for at least 10 days. This can mean students not being able to sample any fresh air and, in some cases, having to rely on contacts in other clusters to shop for their food and leave it outside. I have heard, in recent days, of some universities now paying cleaners to come in, once a week, to clean surfaces in the shared areas (whilst the students remain in their bedrooms). Although any improvement to cleanliness is to be welcomed, this is tokenistic. Given what we now know about Covid-19 transmission, this is likely to have a very minimal effect. The disease is not much dependent on viruses left on surfaces and, even if it were, a once a week clean is not going to achieve much. Most of the viral transmission occurs via aerosols (droplets in the air), as crowded people breathe the air from infected colleagues. So small, contained groups will tend to pass on the infection as they talk or as they simply share space. I appreciate that it would be more expensive and probably require building work but improving ventilation (by better air conditioning?) would be a much more effective means of limiting transmission.

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