Disinfection booth: blessing or curse for spreading of COVID-19 in Bangladesh
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SPECIAL SECTION ON COVID-19: LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Disinfection booth: blessing or curse for spreading of COVID-19 in Bangladesh Md Insiat Islam Rabby 1 Syed Nazmul Huda 6
&
Farzad Hossain 2 & Ferdousi Akter 3 & Riyazul Kabir Rhythm 4 & Tamanna Mahbub 5 &
Received: 22 July 2020 / Accepted: 18 August 2020 # The Canadian Public Health Association 2020
Dear Editor, The utilization of disinfection booths in public places is a great threat for health. During the current COVID-19 pandemic, we noticed disinfection booths in public places of some countries, i.e., Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Turkey. Among these countries, disinfection booths are the most rapidly utilized machine in many public places along with government and non-government organizations in order to minimize the spreading rate of COVID-19. Basically, the installation of a disinfection booth is one attempt to disinfect passengers and avoid cross-infection inside the premises (Khan 2020). Such booths offer a 20–30-second overhead disinfectant shower. According to WHO, it can work on the surface but not on the human body and even has a harmful effect on the human body (Tamilarasu 2020). Therefore, WHO, US Centers for Disease Control (US CDC), Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, and governments of different nations already recommended to stop using this type of booth, but it is still used in some countries, including Bangladesh.
* Md Insiat Islam Rabby [email protected] 1
Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia
2
Department of Mechanical and Production Engineering, Islamic University of Technology, Gazipur 1704, Bangladesh
3
Faculty of Human Ecology, Department of Social and Developmental Sciences, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia
4
Navana CNG Limited, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh
5
Chittagong Medical College, Chattogram 4203, Bangladesh
6
Bangamata Sheikh Fojilatunnesa Mujib Science & Technology University, Jamalpur 2000, Bangladesh
Therefore, healthcare organizations of the whole world need to be focused on this issue as no studies or scientific evidence concerning the effectiveness of a disinfection booth in preventing COVID-19 has yet been proved through comprehensive search. Furthermore, such booths utilize alcohol, bleach, chlorine solution, or chloroxylenol which are harmful to human health (Mallhi et al. 2020). Therefore, it is not advisable to fog or spray particular chemical products, i.e., quaternary ammonium compounds, chlorine-based agents, or formaldehyde. Meanwhile, according to the guidelines of the US CDC, registered disinfectants can only be utilized in the disinfecting and cleaning facilities under the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) (United States Environment Protection Agency (USEPA) 2020). Moreover, the Allergy Society of South Africa strongly condemns the use of a disinfection booth under any circumstances (Gray and van Niekerk 2020). In fact, WHO clearly
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