Various states across the U.S. are relaxing the rules for business reopening. These staged actions include a wider range of businesses at each iteration. They include many retail and food service establishments. With this movement comes the need for businesses to change their models and practices. These changes include new protocols for distancing and UV-C technology for cleaning.
For example, many retail stores will instill multiple requirements. These include limiting occupancy numbers inside the store, checking customer and employee temperatures upon entry, and cleaning various touch points. Restaurants will use stickers to denote six-foot patron spacing. They will also eliminate any self-service options, offer hand sanitizer, and change how patrons wait for seating. In addition, they will implement dozens of other protocols to adapt to the new reality. All these changes are necessary to reduce exposure as well as make consumers more comfortable returning. These adjustments will require staff training, committed managers, and the right tools. Businesses anticipating reopening have another tool to utilize for efficient and reliable sanitization—UV light.
Key Takeaways
- Businesses are adapting to reopening with new safety protocols, including UV-C technology for cleaning.
- UV-C light inactivates microorganisms quickly and can reach areas that cleaning wipes cannot.
- Restaurants can use UV-C to disinfect shared items and enhance customer safety as they reopen.
- Medical facilities benefit from UV-C technology to sanitize equipment and reduce pathogen spread.
- The adoption of UV-C solutions is increasing across various sectors, including transportation and healthcare, indicating its importance in the new normal.
The Power of Light
The typical Clorox or Lysol brand cleaning wipe contains a disinfectant solution that needs to “dwell” on the wiped device for an extended period. There needs to be visible wetness from the product onto the surface. The solution needs this time to break down pathogens. Many users neglect to follow the guidelines for wipe usage. This includes both in terms of dwell time and using them for too many surfaces. This can then move germs from area to area. Performing sanitization through manual wiping takes time and is labor-intensive. Businesses that are already short-staffed and under financial strain due to the pandemic might struggle to keep up with these sanitization practices without additional help.
While liquid cleaning solutions will, of course, remain necessary for soiled items and surfaces, their usage for most items is replaceable through UV-C light applications. UV-C light-producing machines create wavelengths between 100 and 280nm. These are the ranges necessary to inactivate various microorganisms. The DNA and RNA of these pathogens absorb the light, which causes disruptions at the molecular level. This process shuts down their ability to replicate and then infect. These machines provide 360-degree cleaning and can reach into crevices that are often not touched by cleaning wipes.
Multiple Practical Applications
Microorganisms exposed to antibiotics and disinfectants develop resistance over time. However, they are unable to build any resistance to UV-C lights. Their simple operation and non-resistance qualities make these lights ideal for multiple reopening businesses. They are beneficial for practices that want to protect customers and staff.
Within the restaurant sector, UV-C light disinfecting machines are ideal for items such as menus, ordering tablets, and other shared-use pieces. Waiters utilize pens, badges, and ordering terminals during their shifts. Manually cleaning those items with wipes is difficult and unreliable. This is especially true as waiters adapt to new social distancing and other procedural changes. UV-C sanitization works quickly, so staff members can insert various items throughout their work schedule. This ensures pathogen loads on food and other surfaces are reduced. Since the machines work in under a minute, they can also provide sanitization for customers’ car keys, wallets, and phones that are often laid on dining tables.
Restaurants and shops can offer customers phone disinfection upon entering and leaving the restaurant. Additionally, items like menus, tablets, staff badges, keyboards, keys, pens, and other small items used at these businesses can quickly and easily be disinfected using UV-C products. This will keep both staff and other customers safer.
In medical settings, UV-C technology systems provide practitioners with a new tool to reduce exposure to a range of pathogens, not just coronavirus. For example, most patient exam rooms feature computer terminals and shared keyboards for logging in patients and adding clinical notes. These terminals are utilized by multiple nurses and physicians in a day, and clinicians also utilize tablet devices and mobile phones to perform many of the same functions. Frequent UV-C sanitization of these devices can eliminate pathogens, including the coronavirus. This limits the spread of the disease among healthcare workers and patients.
Various products
Products such as the cost-effective Cubby+ and Defender from UV-C provider Vioguard offer an integrated keyboard tray. This creates a schedule to automatically pull the keyboard back into the device for sanitization. Alternatively, they allow the user’s own keyboard, tablet, or phone in an economical manual system for sanitization. This process takes (about) less than 60 seconds and eliminates 99.99% of pathogens lurking on the keyboard. These products use a lock-tight UV-sealed enclosure to conduct the sanitization. This shields users from any potential harmful effects from UV light exposure.
Benefits
The benefits of improved sanitization would apply to the thousands of closed optometry offices, dental practices, and other medical facilities that are not working with COVID-19 patients. On the patient side, tablets used by patients to enter health and insurance information can also receive complete sanitization with UV-C, thus removing fears for patients who are hesitant to receive services during the pandemic. Other shared-use and clinical items can also run through UV-C machines. This further cuts down on a facility’s overall viral load.
As businesses reopen, UV-C technology will likely become a commonplace sanitization practice and a part of everyday life. The New York City subway system is piloting larger-scale UV light solutions for subway cars and buses. The Pittsburgh International Airport is the nation’s first to implement cleaning robots with UV lights to sanitize walkways. These adoptions further highlight the need for tech solutions to slow the pandemic. The role of UV-C lighting will play in reducing the incidence of COVID-19 during the economic reopening.
