Some groups will be in the quarantine facility in rooms with low ventilation and exposure to viral aerosols is high. To test the role of airborne transmission, a team led by UMD mechanical engineering Professor Jelena Srebric will design special ventilation systems. To understand how influenza virus is transmitted, investigators will use two interventions: To block transmission by close-range droplet spray, some of the healthy participants will be asked to wear face shields and wash their hands every 15 minutes, while others will not be given those precautions. Researchers will also recruit people diagnosed with influenza to come stay in the quarantine facility and interact with the healthy people. Wilbur Chen, will recruit groups of healthy people whose antibody levels make them susceptible to influenza and are unvaccinated) to volunteer to live in a quarantine facility watching movies and playing cards, pool and video games together for about two weeks. “My hope is that we can address this persistent controversy that has held up our ability to respond to respiratory pandemics.”Īs part of the project, researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, led by Dr. “The medical community doesn’t yet fully understand aerosols and has been waiting for more evidence from a trial like this one,” said Milton, who will lead the project. Research over the last 20 years by School of Public Health Professor Donald Milton, M.D., has been central to this discussion, and now, Milton and collaborators could put to bed the debate over how viruses spread with help from a $15 million research award from the National Institutes of Health to develop new technologies for collecting viruses from the air and conduct a five-year randomized, controlled trial. However, several recent studies have put the spotlight on aerosols-tiny particles that remain suspended in the air after an infected person breathes or speaks-as the dominant transmission route. When it comes to contracting the flu or other respiratory viral illnesses such as COVID-19, medical experts have long believed the primary culprits were contact with contaminated surfaces or being sprayed by droplets from someone coughing and sneezing nearby.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |