In order to help real estate practitioners preventing novel coronavirus and creating a safe, healthy working environment, ULI China Mainland organized an online sharing session for both members and non-members on 21st February 2020. The speakers of the webinar were Louie Cheng, Founder & President of PureLiving and Kimi Shi, PureLiving’s Director of Consulting. They shared practical guidance on what to do to prevent the spread of virus in workplace on both individual and organization levels and clarified some of the most common myths and misperceptions.

Highlights:

1. Individual Protection Highlight

Mask:: Surgical mask vs. N95 respirators.  While surgical masks are inexpensive and easy to breathe, they are designed to protect others from spray droplets from the wearer and not designed to protect the wearer from airborne transmission.  .  N95 respirators are designed to have a tighter fit on the face and a 10-15x higher level of particulate filtration than surgical masks, but at the cost of greater effort needed to breathe and a much higher price.  Good alternatives to N95 would be other classes of respirators such as FFP1 or FFP3 that also offer good protection but at a lower cost than N95s.Indirect transmission from viruses in droplets transferred from surfaces to hands and then to the mouth or eyes is also another form of transmission that businesses can plan for by distributing hand sanitizer, having mandatory sanitizer stations, and decontaminated.

2. Organization Protection Highlights

To keep workplace or retail space healthy and safe, the operator should assign a control team to oversee the protection work, determine the policy and action plan, and conduct daily follow up, report and review.

During the speech, PureLiving raised up a few issues that were easily overlooked during operation, such as: do surface cleaning before disinfection; considering factors including odor, noise, safety when choosing different disinfectants. Five different disinfectants are introduced. Considering comprehensively, PureLiving recommends ClO2 disinfectant for the daily cleaning of the company because of its high effectiveness, relative benign impacts when breathed in (EPA registered for safety efficacy) and mildness on sensitive equipment and surfaces compared to bleach.

PureLiving summarized with 8 main methods of creating a healthy indoor environment which minimizes risk from Covid-19:

1. Use screening criteria (infrared temperature scanning, recent contact with sick people) to identify and require persons who are sick to stay out to the office and seek medical care.
2. Enforce a 100% hand washing and foot sanitization policy when entering office from outside or returning from the restroom. Advise staff to wear masks in crowded areas. Wash your hands properly: use a hand sanitizer containing more than 60 percent alcohol for 20 seconds.
3. Enforce a workplace entry policy, such that footwear is sterilized before coming into the office. Foot pan containing alcohol can be placed at the entrance.
4. Use proper cleaning practices utilizing correct disinfectant and best practices. It’s important to note that companies don’t have to thoroughly sterilize offices before employees return to the office, because viruses typically can’t survive on their own for more than 3-4
5. General Air Conditioning, Increase outdoor ventilation systems to 100% fresh air and on maximum speed, but restrict use of systems that recirculate air, especially between offices or zones.  Install UV or ionization to inactivate viruses caught on filters. It can be used if the central air-conditioning system in the office supplies a single area (such as cartridge type air conditioners, fan coil units (FCUs), or . If the central air-conditioning system controls multiple areas, it needs to be turn off unless high efficiency filters are employed to control areas and use Bipolar Ionization or UV lights to sanitize.
6. Maximize ventilation using building fresh air system or open windows. Target 30 cubic meters/hr/person or keep indoor carbon dioxide levels at <1000ppm.
7. Increase relative humidity and target within the range 50-65% RH, because viruses are most survivable in cold and dry or wet and dry conditions. Increase temperature to 24C or above (but don’t sacrifice comfort). Therefore, it is recommended to use a humidifier (ultrasonic humidifier/steam humidifier) in the office space.
8. Use filtration, either portable, fixed or in HVAC as respiratory droplets may become bio aerosols upon evaporation. It is worth noting that UV lamp cannot kill the virus in the moving air, cannot take care of all areas, and is harmful to the human body, so the built-in UV light into the air conditioning bellows will be effective. In addition, bipolar innovation is also a good choice.
9. Regularly monitor these efforts by checking humidity, temperature, CO2, PM2.5, and ATP levels (for proper cleaning). PureLiving provides five – parameter indoor environment monitor and ATP tester (audits cleanliness) for leasing.