Toronto Star

UV machine may help disinfect N95 masks

Ontario ‘problem solver’ sends units to hospitals as temporary solution

- GILBERT NGABO

Amid mounting concerns over the shortage of personal protective equipment for frontline workers fighting the spread of COVID-19, an Ontario resident has designed what he says could be a partial solution — a UV light machine designed to sterilize N95 masks for reuse.

Farkas Baranyai of Wellington has teamed up with a couple of local craftspeop­le to assemble two models of the machine, sending one to a local healthcare unit and another to a small hospital.

“Large hospitals may have their own sterilizat­ion systems, but our local health units are in dire need of protective equipment and how to take care of it,” said Baranyai.

Baranyai, an elevator technician, said he happened to read a New York Times article about how researcher­s at the University of Nebraska Medical Centre were using UV rays to sterilize the masks.

“I’m a problem solver, so I thought: I’ve assembled UV units before. If they can do that there, I can build a machine like that here,” he said.

Health-care workers across Canada face a shortage of PPE, and Premier Doug Ford said Ontario could run out of the crucial N95 masks in a week. A shipment of millions of N95s was temporaril­y halted at the U.S. border this week as the country threatened to ban exports, increasing pressure. Local manufactur­ers and university researcher­s have started producing masks.

While research is inconclusi­ve on whether the N95 masks (which keep out airborne particles) can be properly disinfecte­d and safely reused — and which disinfecta­nt methods work — Baranyai said his UV light machine could help for now.

He and two partners assembled the machine in 11 days, from concept to completion. He describes it as a stainlesss­teel box with a hinged lid holding two UVC lights. The interior has a four-square-foot shelf that can hold about 20 masks at a time.

A fundraisin­g effort he launched raised over $800, which helped him buy some of the building materials used.

Baranyai, who called the project a gesture for his community, feared hospitals would turn him down since health authoritie­s have not officially approved. He noted it’s hard to even find the proper channels during a crisis.

The two health-care centres that received these UV light machines have yet to start using them, pending proper guidelines.

Joshua Colby, an ER physician at Prince Edward Family Health Team, which received one of the two machines, said the use of UV light machines to sanitize masks is “a nascent field” with much uncertaint­y.

He mentioned research is underway at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario on the machines’ efficacy on N95 masks. UV light has been used for years in vent-hoods in academic centres where bacterial, viral and cell cultures were used and a sterile setting was needed. There’s some evidence that too much UV light can damage the mask, so a balance has to be found, Colby said.

“I would say that, if we run out of N95 masks, the UV light hood would be a good option to sterilize used masks, although this is based on tenuous research for which there are few guidelines,” he said. “I would certainly prefer to use a UVlight-sterilized N95 over a cloth mask if I were going in to see someone with COVID-19.”

An official from the Lennox & Addington County General

Hospital in Napanee, where the second machine was sent, said it will rely on guidance from Ontario’s health ministry before using it.

The ministry says the evidence on repurposin­g masks is new and evolving. It’s working on options to ensure availabili­ty of PPE for health providers, including the repurposin­g or resteriliz­ation of N95s.

In a memo to stakeholde­rs this week, deputy health minister Helen Angus said the Public Health Agency of Canada has asked for used PPE to be saved for potential reuse.

“Ontario Health is asking hospitals to store used PPE securely and is distributi­ng a survey to understand hospital capacity for reprocessi­ng, based on promising technologi­es to safely reuse PPE,” she wrote.

Ronald Hofmann, professor of civil and mineral engineerin­g at the University of Toronto, said the Nebraska researcher­s have put out some protocols on using UV to disinfect N95 masks. The Internatio­nal UV Associatio­n also believes using UV can sterilize N95 masks. Hofmann said UV can work in theory but its effectiven­ess depends on the details. “The research community is scrambling right now to figure these things out,” he said.

If a hospital runs out of new N95 masks, their choices are to wear nothing, reuse their masks without any treatment, or use some treatment that in theory can do a good job disinfecti­ng them, he said.

“We think that UV, along with heat treatment, and along with hydrogen peroxide vapour, are three good methods that show a lot of promise,” Hofmann said.

 ?? VICTOR BORISOV GETTY IMAGES FILE PHOTO ?? UV light has been used for sterilizat­ion. Some researcher­s say it could be used to treat front-line personal protective equipment.
VICTOR BORISOV GETTY IMAGES FILE PHOTO UV light has been used for sterilizat­ion. Some researcher­s say it could be used to treat front-line personal protective equipment.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from Canada