Recent estimates have placed the omicron peak arriving as early as this month, but the lingering effects of so many infections are likely to have lingering repercussions.

Find out what’s happening in Seattle with free, real-time updates from Patch.

“[S]ome have predicted omicron will peak locally in mid-January, although we can’t know with certainty whether the current surge will peak at that time or how long the peak will last,” Duchin said. “It will likely continue to impact us for many weeks after the peak.”

Hospitalizations have risen rapidly, too, with current COVID-19 patient loads exceeding previous record highs.

“In contrast to the tenfold rise in cases, hospitalizations have increased approximately fivefold from mid-December, when we were averaging about seven per day, to an average of about 34 per day [for] the week ending Jan. 3,” Duchin said. “That’s one person hospitalized every 45 minutes in King County hospitals currently.”

Like with previous strains, the health officer said the risk for hospitalization and other serious outcomes continues to be considerably higher for those who are not fully vaccinated.

“People who are unvaccinated continue to be at the highest risk for COVID-19 infection, hospitalization and death, although we are seeing an increasing number of less severe infections among vaccinated people,” Duchin said. “In the 30 days through (Dec. 22, 2021), people who were not fully vaccinated were 2.5 times more likely to develop COVID-19, 13 times more likely to be hospitalized, and 27 times more likely to die from COVID-19.”

COVID hospitalizations reach new high in King County

As of Friday, Duchin said at least 400 COVID-19 patients were receiving care in King County hospitals, exceeding the previous high of 331, set early last August. The health officer estimates one in seven acute care and ICU beds are currently occupied by people with COVID-19, and the high volume of patients adds to a multi-faceted strain felt at health care facilities across the state.

“The increase in hospitalizations coming on top of the delta surge, and an increase in non-COVID hospitalizations, along with worsening staff shortages and challenges discharging patients is stressing our hospitals now more than ever,” Duchin said.

While omicron can lead to a less severe illness for many who become infected, Duchin said the sheer volume of new cases and very high level of community transmission presents a significant concern for others and poses a serious threat to the region’s health care system.

“[A]lthough omicron illness is uncomplicated for most people and does not appear to be as severe as delta for individual patients, especially those that are vaccinated and boosted, it’s not a mild illness for many and the potential for long COVID remains,” Duchin said. “Its impact on our community, and our health care system’s ability to provide us with the care we need for all sorts of health problems, is equally if not more severe than past variants.”

On Thursday, the Washington State Medical Association sent a letter to Gov. Jay Inslee and state Secretary of Health, asking for a formal crisis declaration and additional resources to assist overrun emergency departments and hospitals pushed beyond capacity across the state.

Specific requests listed the letter include:

• Mobilizing the national guard to help with staffing shortages in both long-term care facilities and hospitals.
• Increasing the budget for the Department of Social and Health Services to immediately hire more staff.
• Continuing and bolstering incentives to long-term care providers for serving patients as they are discharged from hospitals.
• Addressing barriers to guardianship for patients who are ready to be discharged, and allow family members to agree to transfers.

Though King County’s vaccination rates rank among the highest in the nation, with 86 percent of residents 12 and older having completed the series and 93 percent with at least one dose, percentages for boosters vary widely by age. Duchin said rates for boosters or third doses were highest among people 65 and older, at 75 percent, and lowest among people 18 to 34.

Vaccination rates are improving among the youngest eligible groups, with 50 percent of residents ages 5 to 11 having started a series and 37 percent fully vaccinated, Duchin said.

Learn more about getting vaccinated or boosted on the King County website.

The county is working to increase capacity, expand hours and add locations across the region, including new vaccination sites planned to open this month in Renton and downtown Seattle, along with ongoing pop-up clinics and school-based options.

Duchin notes that omicron’s aptitude for infection means counting on vaccines and boosters as the sole defense will not be sufficient.

“Our vaccines, especially with the booster dose, are holding up very well and providing most people with excellent protection from what matters most: serious infections,” Duchin said. “But with omicron, even vaccinated and boosted people can become infected and spread the infection to others. We cant’ rely on vaccination alone when transmission levels are this high. We need to use the same multiple layers of protection we’ve used in the past.”

Those layers include things like limiting indoor activities, especially in crowded or poorly ventilated spaces, using high-quality, well-fitting masks or respirators, improving indoor air quality and following proper isolation guidelines if ill, and quarantining if exposed.

Learn more about the CDC’s updated isolation and quarantine guidelines from Public Health – Seattle & King County.

For face coverings, Duchin said N95, KN95 and KF94 masks offer the most protection, followed by snug-fitting surgical masks and multi-layered cloth masks.

King County works to expand testing options and deliver thousands of rapid test kits

As for testing, Duchin acknowledged recent challenges amid surging demand, including the recent winter weather that prompted closures and infections increasing among staff, which forced some locations to temporarily close or reduce their hours. Despite those factors, Duchin said sites across King County and Seattle performed more than 117,000 tests between Dec. 22 and Jan. 4. King County has also requested that the federal government stand up more testing locations, like the FEMA-operated site that recently opened in Auburn.

Earlier this week, the county announced it had secured 700,000 rapid antigen test kits, with distribution expected to begin Monday for the first 100,000. Duchin said the kits would head first to long-term care facilities, emergency medical services and health care providers with urgent needs, along with correctional facilities, senior centers and community partners.

Duchin said the state Department of Health will soon begin weekly deliveries for an additional 10,000 rapid tests per week, and the governor announced the state will purchase millions more to distribute through various channels, including a partnership with Amazon that will allow residents to order them via a web portal.

The health officer closed out his Friday remarks with a message of hope, despite the latest series of challenges put forth by omicron.

“We’ve shown what we can do when we work together, and right now we need to dig deep for a renewed, community-wide COVID-19 prevention effort over the next few weeks,” Duchin said. “These coming weeks for many may be the most difficult yet. Please take good care of yourselves and do what you can to help one another. Despite the recent setbacks with omicron, the overall arc of this pandemic will be improving and we will get through this. I expect 2022 ultimately will be a much better year.”

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After decades of toxic waste affecting local towns, Martinsville has received federal funds to begin the cleanup of Superfund sites in 2022. 

Photo by Maroš Markovič from Pexels.

Martinsville and 49 other Superfund sites received a $1 billion investment from the $3.5 billion Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed by Pres. Joseph Biden. 

“For more than 100 years, the upper Midwest was the nation’s industrial center.  But when factories and mills closed, they left behind a legacy of toxic sites that are challenging to clean up,” said Debra Shore, EPA regional administrator, in a press release. 

The Pike and Mulberrry streets PCE plume site in Martinsville showed promise for a cleanup makeover due to its several sources of contamination such as chlorinated solvents and tetrachloroethylene (PCE), which can be airborne and found in dry-cleaning products. Long-term exposure can cause “ kidney damage, reduced red blood cells, and blood and immune system effects,” according to the New York State Health Department.

According to the EPA, Pike and Mulberry’s Master Wear, a dry cleaner and laundry of more than 30 years, contaminated Martinsville’s local drinking water wells serving more than 15,000 people.

The Martinsville site was first assessed in 2005, but the national priorities list was not proposed until 2012, finalizing in 2013. The remedial investigation, a study to collect data and determine the extent of the contamination, started in 2014 and was finalized in 2021. Action is expected to take place between February and March 2022, with no projected date to finish the cleanup. 

The first 49 Superfund sites were selected because the work to clean them had already begun but due to lack of funds the cleanup work did not continue. This time, with the federal funding, EPA is ready to start the cleanup and finish it. 

Previous efforts for Martinsville included the creation of a $1.5 million water treatment plant, where the water of three cities is filtered and then treated with chlorine, phosphate and fluoride. This has made the water safe for drinking and fulfills federal and state requirements. 

According to the press release, the $1 billion will be used to focus on vapor contamination near the groundwater plumes, which is the area where it’s known that the water is contaminated with chemicals. Indoor air sampling will help determine locations to install vapor mitigation systems. The funding will also be used to install treatment systems to focus on vapor contaminations. 

As of this year, there are 38 active Superfund sites throughout the state, according to EPA’s database. However, there are 1,322 Superfund sites nationwide. 

A Superfund site is considered contaminated land left behind by abandoned mills and factories that have accumulated toxic waste over time, making it challenging to clean up. Programs such as Superfund redevelopment by the EPA work toward cleaning up listed Superfund sites. 

Research has shown that Superfund sites are harmful to children and others due to toxic chemicals and can cause cancer, birth defect, disabilities and more, according to the Center of Health, Environment and Justice.

Carolina Puga Mendoza is a reporter for TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.

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by Tushar Khurana

In September 2019, Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan signed a law that would tax home heating oil sold within the city and could eventually require residents to upgrade or decommission their heating oil tanks by 2028. The legislation was introduced to meet the City’s climate goals by hastening the transition to cleaner electric home heating across the city. It was also lauded in a mayoral press release as a “bold and thoughtful approach” to environmental policy that “help[s] our most vulnerable residents move off heating oil.” Revenue from the tax is intended to fund rebates for homeowners and help provide 1,000 fully paid electric heat pump installations for low-income residents.

While framed as equitable climate policy, a closer inspection of Seattle’s heating oil tax suggests otherwise. Environmental justice advocates acknowledge the climate, health, and economic impacts of oil heat but contend that the mechanism of the bill places the burden of a clean energy transition on lower-income and BIPOC city residents — a population already disproportionately harmed by fossil fuels.

There are around 150,000 single-family homes within Seattle city limits, according to census data. In correspondence with the Emerald, the Office of Sustainability and Environment (OSE) estimated that 13,000–15,000 of these homes use oil heat, and that number is dwindling. Oil is the most polluting and expensive fuel for home heating and can cost two to three times more than the electricity for a modern heat pump, which also provides air conditioning. This added benefit is particularly crucial as a rapidly changing climate increases the likelihood of warmer temperatures and extreme heat waves — like the record- and asphalt-shattering event the Pacific Northwest witnessed last summer.

Seattle’s oil heating systems — commonly found in older homes — were largely installed between the 1920s and 1950s, and their underground stainless steel oil tanks are known to corrode and leak, contaminating the soil and groundwater. Washington’s Pollution Liability Insurance Agency insures leaking residential oil tanks across the state. In an email to the Emerald, the agency shared that it paid out an average of $17,000 for over 5,000 systems from January to September 2021. The cost of cleaning up the contamination is sometimes greater than the $60,000 insurance limit it provides.

While the downsides to heating oil are abundant, Seattle’s OSE reports that the average cost to convert to an electric heat pump and decommission the oil tank is around $18,000. This is perhaps the main barrier to the transition. 

Given the pandemic, resulting unemployment, and the meteoric rise in housing prices that Seattle has sustained over the years, expecting residents to either retrofit their energy systems or pay the consequences through an added tax would seem callous, and the City appears to agree. Originally scheduled to come into effect in September 2020, the tax — which would have been 24 cents on the gallon — has now been deferred twice and is currently scheduled to kick off in April 2022. 

Community groups are hoping to do away with the tax altogether. “The tax intends to disincentivize oil heat so that homeowners can transition to alternative systems, and use the revenue gained to help relieve the burden on low-income households,” said Debolina Banerjee, climate policy analyst at Puget Sound Sage. “For the high-income and moderately high-income households, it’s easier for them to transition and avoid the tax.” They make this investment and quickly see a payoff on their heating bill. “Low-income households,” Banerjee continued, “get stuck with the extra burden.” These households rarely have the cash or credit score to upgrade their heating system. And landlords lack the incentive to do so as long as their renters are left to foot the bill.

Environmental justice practitioners often refer to “energy burden,” or the percentage of a household’s income that is spent on energy. The U.S. Energy Information Administration has shown that energy costs are regressive, which means that low-income owners typically pay more for their energy than high-income owners, because poorer households tend to use less-efficient energy systems and live in older, poorly insulated houses. One in four U.S. households spend over 6% of their income on energy and forgo food and medicine to afford utility payments. Closer to home, a survey by Puget Sound Sage confirms these findings, adding that participants might also respond to increases in energy prices by not heating their homes, unplugging appliances, and cutting out basic necessities, like rent, mortgage payments, elder care, and child care.

In recognition of this extra burden, most utilities offer income-based assistance programs, but they tend to fall short. Even in Seattle — whose publicly owned utilities have higher rates of energy assistance enrollment than neighboring corporate utilities like Puget Sound Energy — Seattle City Light estimates that 90,000 households qualify for the Utility Discount Program but only 35,000 households are enrolled, often because people simply don’t know the programs exist.

“Outreach and support is often one of the last-considered and least-funded items,” said Banerjee. “The fact is that there is no proactive approach from utilities to reach out to people, help them gain access, or even maintain a record of low-income households.” What’s more, low-income people may have more pressing priorities, like securing housing and food, that prevent them from doing in-depth research into their home energy options.

Curtailing carbon pollution, and doing so urgently, is imperative to staving off increasingly dire climate catastrophes. In Seattle, buildings are the second largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. This is the sector where the energy transition hits home, literally. But homes are at the crosshairs of a crisis in affordability as well.

“One of the things that policy makers fail to understand is that older single-family homes function as low-income housing — not affordable, but low-income housing nonetheless,” explained Maria Batayola, chair of the Beacon Hill Council and environmental justice coordinator for El Centro de la Raza.

By ignoring this precarious reality, the heating oil tax leaves residents in a bind. On the one hand, the tax adds to Seattle’s already high costs of living. On the other hand, retrofitting and weatherizing older houses increases home values and rents and can spur further displacement and gentrification unless explicitly paired with preventative measures. This type of policy outcome is what prompts Batayola to ask the ominous question, “Is there room in Seattle for poor people?”

In the wake of the 2020 uprisings for racial justice and the threat of pandemic-induced cuts to social spending, a coalition of community organizations converged to form the Solidarity Budget platform and call for a City budget that “centers the needs … of Seattle’s most vulnerable residents” and “prioritizes collective care and liberation.” 

This year, one of the Solidarity Budget demands was an ambitious $85 million per year for the next three years, which would fund a complete transition of all homes and buildings off fossil fuels. Community groups arrived at that number in consultation with Seattle’s OSE. The City finally allocated only $1.7 million toward the transition this budget cycle.

By opposing the heating oil tax and offering an alternative, organizers are building upon what is known in climate justice circles as a “just transition” framework. According to the national Climate Justice Alliance network, just-transition initiatives shift us from dirty to clean energy in a manner that is democratic, creates meaningful work, redistributes resources and power, and redresses historical harm. While the current heating oil tax enforces existing patterns of repression, a just transition demands deeper work to challenge those arrangements.

Jess Wallach of 350 Seattle says the City could begin to assist a “just transition” framework “with targeted investments in the 14,000 City-owned affordable housing units, [where] over 70% of households are below 30% of the area median income, and 60% are People of Color.” Transitioning our affordable housing stock could reverse environmental harms within this demographic by cutting carbon emissions, indoor air pollution, and utility bills. Paired with anti-gentrification policy, these retrofits could deter displacement instead of exacerbating it.

Batayola adds that for the remainder of older single-family homes, these retrofits could easily complement pressing community needs. In Beacon Hill, weatherization — which is already included in the program — could include triple-paned windows and HEPA filters to mitigate the noise and air pollution from frequent air traffic.

In addition to the health benefits and utility savings, a planned investment of this nature also promises much-needed jobs. Earlier this year, the City’s Office of Economic Development released a set of recommendations on developing an equitable clean energy workforce. As Wallach suggests, a City-funded transition could make good on those proposals by “ensuring that the new clean energy jobs are union jobs” and by “developing job pipelines, creative partnerships, apprenticeship programs, and recruitment pathways directly from Seattle Public Schools and affordable housing projects to make sure that women and BIPOC folks are getting into these jobs.”

In attempting to replace what Batayola describes as a “middle-class solution” with these types of creative programs rooted in regeneration, the organizers are relying on a holistic community-driven approach. Wallach says the coalition’s proposals only came about because “we were successful in bringing up a conversation with our communities and City leaders about what it’s actually going to take” to address this transition equitably.

Tushar Khurana (he/him) lives, writes, and organizes in South Seattle. He has a background in climate science, environmental policy, and clean energy.

📸 Featured image by kevin brine/Shutterstock.com

Before you move on to the next story …
Please consider that the article you just read was made possible by the generous financial support of donors and sponsors. The Emerald is a BIPOC-led nonprofit news outlet with the mission of offering a wider lens of our region’s most diverse, least affluent, and woefully under-reported communities. Please consider making a one-time gift or, better yet, joining our Rainmaker Family by becoming a monthly donor. Your support will help provide fair pay for our journalists and enable them to continue writing the important stories that offer relevant news, information, and analysis. Support the Emerald!

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Originally Appeared Here

In response to global warming, human beings have been forced to adapt in response to the long-term warming trend. Long-term warming is concomitant with severe weather events such as heatwaves, cold spells, extreme rainfalls, or storms. One adaptation to extreme heat events is the installation of air conditioning (along with heating and ventilation) in homes and public buildings across the world.

Image Credit: Hikari0909/Shutterstock.com

What is known about the health effects of air conditioning?

Current knowledge of air conditioning-related effects on health is based on studies conducted on office workers or an exercise-related heat illness. Moreover, artificial experimental designs on climatic influences on physiology have also been conducted.

Despite this, studies on the effects of air conditioning on health are scarce and there is an absence of knowledge on how the mechanisms affect patient health.

To investigate the available literature, a paper published in BMC public health analyzed the available evidence published in Medline, Embase, and the Cochrane Library. This review focused specifically on patients in hospitals and results were charted according to the intervention, population, control, and outcome.

This literature also investigated any studies that examined the effect of heating and ventilation alongside air conditioning. Collectively, the publication refers to these modes of air and temperature adaptation as Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning (HVAC).

Overall, HVAC was found to improve recovery, notably by improving vital signs, reducing incidents of cardiac stress, accelerating recuperation, and aiding greater physical activity. Moreover, reduced mortality for heat illness patients resulted from the use of HVAC, and resulted in shorter hospital stays for patients with respiratory disease.

Therefore, in the inpatient context, installing HVAC has the potential to improve patient outcomes and increase the efficiency of hospital treatment. This is particularly notable in mitigating the effects of climate change on health and healthcare systems.

Air conditioning in the context of epidemics and pandemics

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the mode by which the SARS-CoV-2 virus spreads has been studied extensively. It is known that the virus is transmitted primarily through close contact transmission specifically when an infected person coughs, talks, sneezes, or otherwise uses their voice at short distances <1–2 m. The airborne transmission of droplet nuclei (aerosolized particles of <5 μm in diameter) is still controversial and some people have been categorized as super emitters, capable of releasing viral particles during normal breathing and speech, coughing, and talking.

Moreover, the airborne transmission of the virus can occur during medical procedures that produced aerosols. As such, preventative measures have been installed. The transmission capacity of aerosol-generating procedures is also dependant on particulates as they can release toxic molecules and microorganisms which include viruses. As such, ventilation systems including heating and air conditioning which involve the recirculation of exhausted air have been subject to review.

Alongside respiratory viruses (influenza and coronaviruses), other microorganisms such as vegetative bacteria (staphylococci and legionellae), fungi, (Aspergillus and Penicillium), mycobacteria (tuberculous and nontuberculous), enteric viruses (noro- and rotaviruses), and bacterial spore formers (Clostridium difficile and Bacillus anthracis), can also be spread by air. The virality of such pathogens is dependent on the air temperature, relative humidity, and turbulence, among other factors.

As such, air conditioning can spread these pathogenic bacteria, especially when air conditioners do not have an efficient filtration system. Moreover, the risk of air conditioning-caused infections increases when the size of room ventilated increases (making it high in public places like department stores, airplanes, ships, and hospitals).

This is exacerbated as air conditioners do not cool hot air coming from the outside, but rather recirculate indoor air to keep this cool. This results in significantly reduced air exchange while increasing the concentration of pollutants and infectious agents that can exacerbate their pathogenic activity owing to the favorable effects of artificially cold and dry air.

Air  conditioning impact on respiratory health

Air conditioning can result in heightened clinical discomfort in those who last suffer from respiratory illnesses. In cases of chronic respiratory illness, there is a risk of worsening symptoms. Moreover, respiratory infections may be caused by cold air because of increased bronchial inflammation which works alongside other trigger factors such as infection, pollutant inhalation, cigarette smoke, and irritants present in the air.

In healthy individuals, exposure to air conditioners with very cold air can cause alterations in the respiratory airways that, in the context of pre-existing conditions such as asthma, can increase the risk of developing a respiratory illness.

In conditions where the temperature of the air drops quickly, even for small changes between but more markedly for changes more than 5 °C, there is a possible negative consequence exerted on the respiratory system. This effect is most pronounced in those with obstructive respiratory illnesses such as asthma and COPD. Cold air is also known to trigger bronchoconstriction in asthmatics

The effect of air conditioners on cognitive performance

Research from the Harvard Chan school of public health demonstrated that increased indoor temperatures during a heatwave produced detrimental cognitive effects in a group of young healthy individuals without air conditioning. The study followed 44 students from a university in Massachusetts living in air-conditioned and non-air-conditioned buildings before, during, and after a heatwave.

The participants were subject to two cognition tests and the effect of the heatwave on the cognitive function was evaluated. The group found that cognitive function deficits resulted from indoor thermal conditions caused by heatwaves in non-AC buildings. The researchers suggested that this decline in cognitive function could be attributed to increased thermal load and exacerbated effects of other environmental and behavioral factors.

This corroborates existing experimental, epidemiological, and econometric studies that have shown that heat exposure can negatively affect productivity, learning ability, mortality, and mobility in humans.

Other positive impacts of air conditioners on health

Air conditioning critically maintains body temperature. This is critical in humid and hot areas of the world where heatstroke is a sizeable problem during peak summer. Although humans can acclimatize to hot environments, this typically occurs over a long period (7 to 14 days with at least two hours of daily heat exposure) and it is possible for people to lose heat acclimatization when spending the majority of their time in air-conditioned environments. They subsequently find it more difficult to reacclimatise in the future.

Air conditioners are also useful in aiding sleep through the triggering of homeostatic mechanisms to cool the body. Air conditioners can also decrease the incidence of allergic reactions as, if the air conditioners are confined to small spaces in which air is exchanged with the outside, any allergens can be cleared.

References:

• Lenzer B, Rupprecht M, Hoffmann C, et al. (2020) Health effects of heating, ventilation and air conditioning on hospital patients: a scoping review. BMC Public Health. doi: 10.1186/s12889-020-09358-1.
• Chirico F, Sacco A, Bragazzi NL, et al. (2020) Can Air-Conditioning Systems Contribute to the Spread of SARS/MERS/COVID-19 Infection? Insights from a Rapid Review of the Literature. Int J Environ Res Public Health. doi:10.3390/ijerph17176052.
• Cedeño Laurent JG, Williams A, et al. (2018) Reduced cognitive function during a heat wave among residents of non-air-conditioned buildings: An observational study of young adults in the summer of 2016. PLoS Med. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1002605.
• D’Amato M, Molino A, Calabrese G, et al. (2018) The impact of cold on the respiratory tract and its consequences to respiratory health. Clin Transl Allergy. doi: 10.1186/s13601-018-0208-9.

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Originally Appeared Here

Vaccines, face masks strongly encouraged for faculty, staff and students

Faculty, staff and students are returning to campus at a time when cases of COVID are once again on the rise in the local community, state, nation and world.

The Omicron variant is highly transmissible, rapidly overtaking the Delta variant as the dominant strain of the virus in the United States over the holiday season.

Vaccines

Those who have not yet been vaccinated are strongly encouraged to do so. Data clearly demonstrate that vaccinations and boosters provide our best defense against COVID variants. Although break-through cases are possible, the risk of severe illness is significantly lower among those who have been fully vaccinated and boostered. The University Health Center offers first, second and booster doses of the Pfizer vaccine free of charge to faculty, staff, students and their eligible dependents aged 16 and up. To date, the UHC has provided more than 32,000 COVID vaccinations.

As of Jan. 4, faculty and staff who would like to schedule a COVID vaccine appointment at the University Health Center may do so by calling 706-542-5575. Students may continue to schedule their COVID vaccine appointments online through the Patient Portal. While supplies last, those getting a vaccine can also receive a $20 gift card following vaccination.

Surveillance testing

Surveillance testing remains an important step in the defense against infection. The University Health Center and Veterinary Diagnostic Labs are equipped to test up to 800 people per day for COVID variants. These tests are free to faculty, staff and students. Click here to schedule an appointment. Walk-ups are also welcome. Over the next three weeks, testing will be expanded through pop-up locations at the Tate Student Center offered by the College of Public Health on January 11, 13, 18, 20, 25 and 27 from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Remember that any faculty, staff or student who tests positive for COVID is required to report that positive test through DawgCheck and to follow the advice provided. Typically, a positive test will require a period of isolation, depending on the test results. Quarantining also applies to unvaccinated individuals who are identified to have been in close contact with an infected individual. The Georgia Department of Public Health recently changed its protocols on quarantine and isolation to reflect CDC guidance, and UGA is now following the new guidance. Click here to see the latest information.

Face masks

Faculty, staff and students are strongly encouraged to wear face masks when inside campus buildings. Face coverings are required on Campus Transit buses in accordance with federal transportation rules. The university has approximately 45,000 KN95 masks in stock for distribution. Departments interested in having masks on hand can order them at no cost through UGAmart. Students can pick up masks at information desks in the Tate Student Center and the Miller Learning Center, while supplies last.

Cleaning and disinfection

The Facilities Management Division will continue to follow the special cleaning and disinfection protocols that have served the UGA community so effectively over the past two years. In addition, FMD will continue to re-stock and supply the existing hand sanitizing stations and wipes for individual use in offices, breakrooms and classrooms. Information on cleaning frequency and protocol, sanitizing stations or wipes, and to request additional cleaning service can be found here. The plexiglass shields installed in classrooms, buses, point-of-sale locations and other settings also will remain. Information on ordering new or replacement shields can be found here.

For the past two years, FMD has been focused on improving ventilation and indoor air quality across campus. This FMD interactive website illustrates the location of buildings with completed, in-progress or in-design HVAC air quality improvement projects. In this academic year alone, more than $7 million in targeted projects to improve HVAC systems across campus is being done, with 16 of 18 HVAC replacement projects already completed. UV total disinfection arrays were installed over Fall Semester in the Miller Learning Center, Caldwell Hall, Tate Student Center, Park Hall, Joe Frank Harris, Bolton and the Main Library. More UV arrays will be installed in Aderhold, Sanford and Boyd Graduate Studies this month. All the work is in accordance with CDC, DPH and HVAC industry standards.

Additional resources

Student Affairs also will continue to hold a stock of beds for potential quarantine and isolation needs by UGA students, and the Student Care and Outreach team stands ready to assist.

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Baltimore-based St. John Properties, one of the mid-Atlantic region’s largest privately held commercial real estate firms, has beefed up its sustainability efforts at all of its properties.

Edward St. John, founder and chairman of St. John Properties — which just celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2021 — noted that the company prefers to initiate portfolio-wide initiatives as it implements its sustainable strategy.

For instance, St. John Properties installed electric vehicle charging stations at all its newly constructed multi-story office buildings in an effort to support the use of energy efficient EVs.

Across the company’s portfolio, which encompasses more than 22 million square feet of commercial real estate in eight states and, St. John Properties ranked as the top green building developer across Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia, according to the U.S. Green Building Council. 

Commercial Observer spoke with St. John about the importance of sustainability to his company.

What is St. John Properties’ sustainability philosophy?

Our mission is to retain our leadership role in developing sustainable sites and buildings, while maintaining indoor environments that promote employee wellness and conserve energy. We believe the conservation of energy and natural resources, along with the ongoing need to develop and innovate environmentally friendly buildings, have become a priority in attracting new tenants.

What are some of your long-term sustainability goals?

Among our significant sustainability efforts is to work toward a scalable and economic solar approach on top of all building types and to deliver buildings that naturally produce more energy than they use. Future sustainability endeavors also include a focus on building health and wellness and the continuation of our LED lighting program, which has resulted in the upgrade of more than 10,000 office lighting fixtures throughout the portfolio.

Talk about efforts with materials on new developments. What’s being done there?

We only specify building materials produced with low or zero volatile organic compounds to eliminate off-gassing. This includes interior paints, sealants, glues and coatings.

How will you reduce energy inside new buildings?

St. John Properties employs a multi-tiered approach to energy conservation with the specification of efficient lighting fixtures, high-grade insulation, white reflective roofs, top-of-the-line window systems and the installation of high-performance HVAC systems. Having quality HVAC equipment is not enough, as it is critical to operate the system in the correct manner, or efficiency benefits will be minimized or lost.

Air quality is becoming an important issue, what’s being done there?

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic heightened our focus on the air quality of our indoor environments, therefore we launched our UV Whole Building Air Purification process in 2021. The program is a multi-step strategy featuring the installation of UV-C light disinfecting systems designed to eliminate airborne pathogens such as fungal spores, bacteria and viruses that pass through a building’s HVAC equipment. The process involves replacing existing HVAC air filters with models that capture more airborne particles; upgrading coil cleaning and HVAC system sanitation, resulting in increased air flow; and utilizing longer HVAC runtimes, allowing for more frequent fresh air circulation throughout a building. This process began in 2021 with portions of our Maryland portfolio comprising 2.4 million square feet of space.

We consistently monitor and rely on guidance from the most respected asset management industry groups including the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers and the Building Owners and Managers Association. Our intelligence gathering remains active and we intend to continue our quest to identify the most highly effective and long-term solutions to the air quality issue.  

How has the need and desire for sustainable space evolved over the last few years?

Leasing space in sustainable buildings has become a point of emphasis among companies in all industry sectors and, in the case of the local, state and federal government as well as many Fortune 500 companies, it has become a prerequisite for new real estate searches. Companies are increasingly interested in reducing their energy usage and associated expenses. They recognize the health and employee productivity benefits of a green building. In addition, more and more clients are specifying the use of natural lighting to filter into workspaces, as well as the incorporation of outdoor spaces into traditional designs.

Why is it important to the company to implement these sustainable efforts?

Our long-term success is predicated on listening to our clients to better understand their needs. The health and safety of our clients and staff continue to be our top priority, and we recognize that indoor air quality and a safe working environment remain utmost in the minds of many. We were always motivated to implement innovative air purification measures and to achieve LEED-certified status and, over the past 18 months, have significantly increased our efforts throughout our portfolio.

Keith Loria can be reached at [email protected]. 

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It’s still hard to know how to feel about indoor entertainment, indoor gatherings, indoor air. Everyone’s pandemic-risk calculations are different.

Just before Christmas, I attended the phenomenal “Beyond Van Gogh” immersive experience, and subsequently bought surprise tickets for my family. Score! The perfect experience-not-thing holiday gift. Omicron arrived with a thud about two seconds later, and we decided against going. Ditto New Year’s Eve plans at a nightclub.

So what about the cinema? Are people going? Richard Beer, programming director at downtown Vancouver’s Kiggins Theatre, said he’s been pleased by healthy turnout for recent screenings of everything from a niche skiing documentary to the holiday classic “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Advance ticket sales for a new second-Saturday series of live events for kids, sponsored by Columbia Play Project, have also been strong, and Beer’s fingers are crossed. Saturday’s debut features The Amazing Bubble Man.

Meanwhile, the debut of a locally produced documentary about oil-train and oil-terminal battles, featuring a Q&A with the director, has been postponed from early January until March 20.

“The industry is a mess all over,” Beer said.

Hollywood on Hollywood

Judging by its record of self-evisceration, the baby movie industry took about five minutes to recognize its own dark side and start milking that, too, for great stories and great profits. As early as 1923, a silent film called “Souls For Sale” unleashes a murderer on a movie set. “What Price Hollywood?” from 1932 follows the rise and fall of a naive young actress in the clutches of an alcoholic director. “Sullivan’s Travels” (1941) is about a director who abandons Tinseltown because he can’t get a serious, relevant movie financed.

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This time two years ago, many Australians were organising their bushfire go-bag; a kit of emergency items set aside to ensure families were able to evacuate safely at a moments notice.

We’re now facing a different disaster: a growing COVID-19 outbreak that has seen cases around the country skyrocket to previously unfathomable numbers. 

And like bushfires, it can pay to be prepared — especially if you live in a sharehouse or multigenerational household. Only this time the preparation will not be for an evacuation but quite the opposite: being isolated at home if someone in the household tests positive.

Catch up on the main COVID-19 news from January 7 with a look back at our blog.

“Lots and lots of people have COVID, far more in Australia than any other time … so people have to realise that this is something that might happen to them,” says James McCaw, an epidemiologist at the University of Melbourne.

“If you don’t spread it to your housemates, or you spread it to fewer of them, you’re not just helping them — you’re helping the whole of society.”

When a household case is detected, you should act as if everyone in the home is infected until proven otherwise. Under the current close contact rules, household members of a positive case are required to isolate for seven days, even if they test negative.

So what things should you discuss with your household before an infection happens? And if it does, how can you ensure everyone gets through an isolation period safely?

Before a positive test

COVID-19 is at its most infectious in the days before symptoms hit. This means, unfortunately, you may not know that there’s a positive case in the house until it’s too late.

With the virus circulating widely, the first step should be establishing whether anyone in your household is particularly vulnerable to the disease and what everybody’s risk tolerance is. 

Depending on your level of concern, this may mean: wearing masks in common areas in the home even before symptoms, limiting visitors, and doing regular rapid antigen tests after high-risk events. 

“Right now, when there’s very high community transmission, everyone can take some simple steps to reduce the risk in the household,” says Raina MacIntyre, an infectious diseases expert at the Kirby Institute. 

“Because most transmission happens in the household.”

This is also a good time to seal gaps around doors, especially if you live in an apartment. Professor MacIntyre says a good test is whether you can smell your neighbour’s cooking — if you can, it means you are breathing in air that could be carrying the virus. 

To do this you can use adhesive strips, which attach to the bottom of the door, or fabric door stops. “That means your household is prepared,” she says. “If somebody gets the virus, it’s prepared for a bedroom to be an isolation space.”

Can you isolate within your home?

The next step is figuring out whether you could safely isolate a positive case away from others who test negative. 

This means separate bedrooms, but also,  bathrooms, balconies, and other common areas. Having a plan in place for how you will manage this will make things easier if you have to quickly respond to an infection.

If two people are sharing a bedroom, can one person sleep on the couch or even, as Deakin University epidemiologist Catherine Bennett suggests, in a tent or campervan in the backyard? Alternatively, it may be worth considering whether there’s another location — away from other people — where part of the household can isolate, especially if there are people in the home particularly vulnerable to COVID-19.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume.WatchDuration: 2 minutes 37 seconds2m 37s What to do if you’re unwell and suspect you have COVID but can’t get a test.

When deciding where an infected person should isolate, it makes sense to pick a room that isn’t adjacent to common areas, like the kitchen, where other household members will be gathering.

If the house has more than one bathroom, one should be set aside for COVID-positive people to use. If there’s a bedroom with an ensuite, Dr Bennett suggests switching rooms if necessary so the person with an infection can remain as isolated as possible.

In households with only one bathroom, it’s important for there to be as little crossover as possible. After every use, it should be wiped down with disinfectant. Any windows in the bathroom should remain open, fans on and the toilet flushed with the lid closed.

As it’s unlikely your home will have more than one kitchen, it’s also important to consider how to get meals to the COVID positive person. In most cases, this will mean other household members delivering food, snacks and essentials to the infected person’s door. When doing so, wear a mask and consider the next point — airflow.

What’s the airflow like?

COVID-19 is an airborne virus, meaning you don’t have to be in the immediate vicinity of a positive case to contract it.

In a household, that means making sure the building is a ventilated as possible. “This virus is spread through the air you breathe, you can scrub your hands till the cows come home but if you don’t pay attention to safe indoor air you’re going to get infected,” Professor MacIntyre says. 

Can you open windows and doors at each end of the house, forcing air to disperse and circulate more quickly? If you have an air purifier, put it in corridors or low-ventilated spaces near where the positive person is isolated. 

Read more about the Omicron variant:

When delivering food to the COVID-positive person, Professor Bennett says you should leave some time after the door was last opened to allow any infected air to move on. “If I was walking up to the door, I’d put my mask on, I’d fan the air away in front of me to make sure it’s not still air, and I’d pick up the tray and go away,” she says.

She also warns that air conditioning can pose a risk if the air is recycled throughout the house. “If you’ve got someone who’s locked away, and it’s a really hot day and you have your aircon on, you’ve got to understand where your return is, where the air is drawn back out,” Professor Bennett says. “Is it going to take that person’s air back through common areas?”

And what about surfaces? Professor Bennett says surface transmission is relatively low risk compared to airborne transmission, but it’s still something to be mindful of “especially if the person is symptomatic and their coughing”.

To combat this she recommends being “fastidious” about hand washing and hygiene.

What things should you have in your COVID kit?

Once a household case is detected, it’s too late for any member of the household to go shopping — that’s why it may be helpful to have some basic things on hand, both for infection control and managing symptoms.

Having them all in one place will also allow you to act quickly, limiting the positive person’s exposure to the rest of the household. So, what should you have on hand?

For infection control, Professor Bennett says surgical masks should be enough for most scenarios but if you want to be extra careful, it may be worth investing in a stash of N95 masks.

Disposable gloves for handling dishes may provide an extra layer of protection, but shouldn’t substitute good hand hygiene. Cleaning products such as household disinfectants, hand soap, hand sanitiser and disinfection wipes will also be useful.

Rapid antigen tests are an important part of any COVID-19 kit. (ABC News: Maren Preuss)

It’ll also be important to have a supply of rapid antigen tests available, ideally at least two per person in the household; one to establish whether there’s an infection and another to follow up with later on in the isolation period.

When it comes to symptom management, Professor Bennett says what will be most needed will be different for everyone. Some basics include pain medication, like Panadol or Nurofen, Hydralyte or iceblocks, a thermometer to monitor fevers, and a pulse oximeter to measure oxygen levels. These devices can be purchased for around $30 and are a good way to indicate whether a COVID-19 case needs medical treatment. 

It’s also important to ensure you have at least a two-week supply of any regular medication, enough food — having some frozen meals ready to go could be a lifesaver when fatigue hits — and the contact details for medical support or assistance.

And lastly, don’t forget activities to keep you entertained throughout the isolation period. 

“I would have in my personal kit, if I was going to put one together, Panadol and a good book,” Professor Bennett says. “Pull it out, put it beside the bed, and relax, because [you’re] going to feel tired and won’t want to do a whole lot — it’s a care kit.”

What you need to know about coronavirus:

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