DESCRIPTION OF THE SESSION

The COVID-19 pandemic raises the publics’ attention on cross infections in the indoor environment. WHO has identified airborne transmission as a principal route for SARS-CoV-2, especially in crowded and poorly ventilated indoor environments. In fact, airborne transmission is one of the primary routes for many infectious diseases, such as anthrax, chickenpox, and influenza. The airborne cross-infection risk between people is influenced by many parameters, such as distance, relative position, respiratory activities, room ventilation, face mask, or other protection equipment. Effective control of these influencing factors can be important to mitigate airborne transmission risk between people. Many prevention measures were recommended by authorities during COVID-19, but their protective effects regarding airborne transmission are still under discussion.

The main objective of this workshop is to discuss the mechanism of airborne transmission and the engineering control solutions.  Through the discussion, the workshop will find out some effective and efficient control measures to reduce airborne cross-infection risk. Discussion topics include:

1. What are the parameters influencing the cross-infection risk?
2. What are the challenges to reduce infection risk indoors?
3. How to design indoor airflow distribution to reduce the indoor exposure?
4. Are there any other engineering control solutions and what are their efficiency?
5. Where these engineering control solutions may be applied

  OBJECTIVES OF THE SESSION

The main objective of this workshop is to discuss the mechanism of airborne transmission and the engineering control solutions. 

  SESSION PROGRAMME

1. 1. Opening. Alireza Afshari, Aalborg University, Denmark
   2. Human exposure against airborne pathogens in office environment. Risto Kosonen, Aalto University, Finland
   3. Questions and discussion
   4. Discussion on minimum ventilation rates for infection control. Yuguo Li, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
   5. Questions and discussion
   6. Mitigation of airborne transmission of respiratory viruses by ventilation – past, present and future. Arsen Krikor Melikov, Technical University of Denmark, Denmark
   7. Questions and discussion
   8. Point source ventilation effectiveness in infection risk-based post-COVID ventilation design. Jarek Kurnitski, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia
   9. Airborne transmission of disease in stratified and non-stratified flow. Peter V. Nielsen, Aalborg University, Denmark
   10. Questions and discussion
   11. Discussion with the audience

  SESSION CHAIRS

1. 1. Peter V. Nielsen, Aalborg University, Demark
   2. Chen Zhang, Aalborg University, Denmark

  SESSION DURATION

–90 minutes