Survival and disinfection of an enveloped surrogate virus on Tyvek suits used for health care personal protective equipment

• Published in: American journal of infection control Vol. 44; no. 12; pp. 1734 - 1735
• Main Authors: Brown, Travis W., MPH, Chen, Weiyu, MPH, Casanova, Lisa M., PhD
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 01.12.2016; Mosby-Year Book, Inc
• Subjects: bacteriophage; Bacteriophages - drug effects; Bacteriophages - isolation & purification; Bacteriophages - physiology; disinfection; Disinfection & disinfectants; Disinfection - methods; Health Personnel; Humans; Infection Control; Infectious Disease; Medical personnel; Microbial Viability - drug effects; Models, Biological; Personal Protective Equipment; Polymers; Protective Clothing - virology; Survival analysis; Time Factors; Viral Load; Virus; Virus Inactivation - drug effects; Viruses; Virus; personal protective equipment; disinfection; bacteriophage
• ISSN: 0196-6553; 1527-3296
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ajic.2016.04.247

Highlights • At 6 hours, inactivation of Φ6 on Tyvek suits was 2.3 log10 at 40% relative humidity (RH) and 2.0 log10 at 60% RH. • After 1-minute contact time, there was a >3.2-log10 reduction of Φ6 on Tyvek coupons by 0.825% hypochlorite (95% confidence interval [CI], 2.59-3.82) and >4.3-log10 reduction by quaternary ammonium at the manufacturer's use dilution (95% CI, 4.22-4.44). • These results support current guidelines calling for chemical disinfection of personal protective equipment infection control measures to prevent both contamination of the wearer and the environment during removal.