One of the UK's leading recruitment companies has trialled a novel air disinfection device and reports a dramatic reduction in the spread of infections at the company's Milton Keynes headquarters.
Jonathan Harvey is a senior manager at the recruitment company F10. He says: "We installed an Air Disinfection (AD) Unit from Inov8 Science in one of our main offices during April 2009 and since that time we have witnessed a substantial drop in the levels of staff sickness."
The AD Unit is a small device that plugs into a normal mains socket and emulates the natural air disinfection properties of the open air by emitting a constant low-level stream of hydroxyl radicals which attack airborne pathogens such as bacteria and viruses.
Laboratory trials proving the effectiveness of the AD Unit have previously been conducted at the Health Protection Agency's laboratories at Porton Down and at Leeds University.
Commenting on the trial conducted at F10, Jonathan Harvey says: "We were aware of the success that Inov8 Science has achieved in the healthcare sector, so we saw this as an opportunity to provide a higher level of protection for our staff and to reduce staff absence through illness."
"We have the AD unit on a timer so that it provides automatic protection between 6am and 8pm. At the beginning of 2009, when the AD was first installed, we were unaware of the forthcoming swine flu pandemic so the added protection that the unit provides has been an additional bonus."
A Government report on the qwine flu pandemic has warned that 'the worst-case clinical attack rate across the population as a whole is 12% between now and the end of the normal flu season. This means that in the peak week of the pandemic up to 1.5 million people may become ill and 5% of people could be absent from work' over and above normal winter absence rates.
As President Obama declares the H1N1 influenza a national emergency and UK cases of swine flu increase dramatically as the second wave takes hold, Inov8 Science is seeking to publicise the capabilities of the AD as widely as possible so that organisations can employ this technology to protect staff, customers and visitors. The company's Chief Technology Officer, Dr Ian Widger says: "Employers are bracing themselves for the second wave of swine flu and if staff sickness levels are anywhere near those outlined in the Cabinet Office/Department of Health planning assumptions, the financial implications would be extremely serious."
Typically, an employee suffering from swine flu will be absent for about nine days, so Dr Widger believes the cost of Air Disinfection units "will be negligible in comparison with the potential costs of staff sickness."
Summarising feedback from the trail at F10, Jonathan Harvey says: "Since the unit was installed, we have noticed that when staff are ill they have not passed their illness to their colleagues. For example, some individual staff have had swine flu but they have not passed it on to their colleagues and we are convinced that the AD unit is the reason for this."
One of the UK's leading recruitment companies has trialled a novel air disinfection device and reports a dramatic reduction in the spread of infections at the company's Milton Keynes headquarters.