Enveloped Virus Inactivation on Personal Protective Equipment by Exposure to Ozone
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Abstract
Ozone is a highly oxidizing gas easily generated from atmospheric oxygen with inexpensive equipment and is commonly used for the disinfection of municipal water, foods, and surfaces. We report tests of the ability of ozone to inactivate enveloped respiratory viruses (influenza A virus and respiratory syncytial virus), chosen as more easily handled surrogates for SARS-CoV-2, on N95 respirators and other personal protective equipment (PPE) commonly used in hospitals. At 20 ppm, an ozone concentration easily achieved by standard commercial equipment, the viruses were inactivated with high efficiency as long as the relative humidity was above a threshold value of approximately 50%. In the absence of humidity control, disinfection is more variable and requires considerably longer exposure under relatively dry conditions. This report extends the observations of a previous publication ( http://doi.org/10.1080/01919510902747969 ) to hospital-relevant materials and provides additional details about the relationship of humidity to the antiviral activity of ozone. Home CPAP disinfection devices using ozone can provide effective results for individuals. Ozone did not appear to degrade any of the materials tested except for elastic bands if strained during treatment (such as by the pressure exerted by stapled attachment to N95 respirators). The filtration efficiency of N95 respirator material was not compromised. Overall, we recommend exposures of at least 40 minutes to 20 ppm ozone and >70% relative humidity at ambient temperatures (21-24°C) for 4-log (99.99%) reduction of viral infectivity on a variety of PPE, including gowns, face shields, and respirators. Shorter exposure times are likely to be effective under these conditions, but at the risk of some variability for different materials. Higher ozone concentrations and higher humidity levels promoted faster inactivation of viruses. Our work suggests that ozone exposure can be a widely accessible method for disinfecting PPE, permitting safer re-use for healthcare workers and patients alike in times of shortage.
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SciScore for 10.1101/2020.05.23.20111435: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Cell Line Authentication not detected. Table 2: Resources
Experimental Models: Cell Lines Sentences Resources RSV was propagated in HEp-2 cells, where virus was added to cells at a MOI of 0.1 for 1 h before adding virus growth medium (DMEM with 10% fetal bovine serum and 1% pen-strep) to the inoculum. HEp-2suggested: NoneMDCK cells (IAV) or HEp-2 cells (RSV) plated in a 24 well plate at confluency were washed once with 1×PBS and then incubated with 100 μL of virus inoculum for 1 hour at 37°C, being rocked every 15 minutes. MDCKsuggested: NoneR…
SciScore for 10.1101/2020.05.23.20111435: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Cell Line Authentication not detected. Table 2: Resources
Experimental Models: Cell Lines Sentences Resources RSV was propagated in HEp-2 cells, where virus was added to cells at a MOI of 0.1 for 1 h before adding virus growth medium (DMEM with 10% fetal bovine serum and 1% pen-strep) to the inoculum. HEp-2suggested: NoneMDCK cells (IAV) or HEp-2 cells (RSV) plated in a 24 well plate at confluency were washed once with 1×PBS and then incubated with 100 μL of virus inoculum for 1 hour at 37°C, being rocked every 15 minutes. MDCKsuggested: NoneResults from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).
Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.
Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.
Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.
Results from rtransparent:- Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- No protocol registration statement was detected.
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