How Buildings can Make a Pandemic Worse
Leslie Dietz, Patrick F. Horve, David A. Coil, Mark Fretz, Jonathan A. Eisen, Kevin Van Den Wymelenberg: “2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic: Built Environment Considerations To Reduce Transmission”, mSystems (2020) Like most people, I’ve been holed up and socially isolating during this pandemic. While doing so, I have been thinking a bit about building design and how most people live, commute, and work in environments that seem designed to maximize the spread of disease. The Legionnaires’ outbreak back in 1976 should have served as a wake-up call about pathologically bad building design. Of course, Legionella bacteria are both substantially larger and thanks to antibiotics, infections are easier to treat, than a virus. Coincidentally, UC Davis, my alma mater , has been making an effort to keep the media informed about the latest published research about coronavirus (AKA COVID-19, AKA SARS-CoV-2) and posted a note about a literature review that was just published in the Am...