As we know, pneumonia caused by nCoV (Coronavirus) is usually spread through the respiratory tract due to the body's contact with saliva, mucus or fluid of an infected person. If we contact an infected person within a distance of 2 meters, in over 10 minutes, you will highly possibly be infected. The risk of being infected at the airport, on the airplane is the same as in narrow and crowded spaces such as buses and trains.
It is because liquid particles carrying Corona virus can stick on many often-touch surfaces of things at the airports such as chairs, escalator handrails, food trays, handle of restroom’s door,... passengers should wash their hands regularly with water and soap within at least 20 seconds. In case, it is impossible to wash your hands in the restroom, you should use alcoholic hand sanitizer instead.
Escalator handrails
Dr. Amesh Adalja, infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University (U.S) defined that escalator handrails are one of the places which are home of the most bacteria at the airport as many people hold for safety. After leaving escalator handrails, you should go to the restroom or use hand sanitizer to wash your hands to remove pathogens.
Door handles
Even if you touch door handles or push luggage carts, you should clean your hands as soon as possible. These touching points are having a lot of bacteria and touched by different persons, and you will be easily infected. Health specialists suggested that passengers should bring a hand sanitizer with alcoholic concentration of over 60%. However, it is impossible to remove bacteria as effective as soap, hand sanitizer will be a good choice in urgent cases.
Trays at security gates
These places are occupied by passengers’ things such as shoes, bags, hats, keys… Liquid particles carrying Corona can stick on trays where the previous infected person touched.
Items in the restroom
Although toilets at the airports or on the airplanes are well cleaned frequently, you should be careful when touching on surfaces of things inside. Passengers use the restroom in different ways, so make sure that you should wash your hands at least 20 seconds before leaving. After that, you should use paper tissue to cover your hands when touching the faucet and door handle.
Eating tables on airplanes
Eating tables’ surface has plenty of pathogens, but it is hard for passengers not to touch them when eating or working during flight time. In this case, you can use disinfectant tissue to clean the surface in advance. After using these tables, you need to wash your hands with soap or hand sanitizer. Especially, do not let your food touch the table’s surface.
Touch screens
Enjoying touch screens on air is an interesting thing, but do not be infected from them. Previous passengers using the screens can leave viruses and bacteria. Thus, you should make sure to bring hand sanitizer aftering using the touch screens.