239 Scientists Say Small Virus Aerosols are Causing Infection in a Letter to WHO

Technology and Pharmaceutical Solutions Suppliers Rather than Countries Should be the Guiding Force

China has been Preparing for COVID since 2005

Mann + Hummel has Filter Cubes for Public Spaces and Even for Subways

Mann+Hummel Supplying the HEPA Filter in the Ford-Produced Respirator

Large-Scale Production and Supply of Facemask Media

Ultrafiltraton Membranes to Remove Multi Resistant Germs from Wastewater

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239 Scientists Say Small Virus Aerosols are Causing Infection in a Letter to WHO

The coronavirus is finding new victims worldwide, in bars and restaurants, offices, markets and casinos, giving rise to frightening clusters of infection that increasingly confirm what many scientists have been saying for months: The virus lingers in the air indoors, infecting those nearby.

If airborne transmission is a significant factor in the pandemic, especially in crowded spaces with poor ventilation, the consequences for containment will be significant. Masks may be needed indoors, even in socially distant settings. Health care workers may need N95 masks that filter out even the smallest respiratory droplets as they care for coronavirus patients.

Ventilation systems in schools, nursing homes, residences and businesses may need to minimize recirculating air and add powerful new filters. Ultraviolet lights may be needed to kill viral particles floating in tiny droplets indoors.

The World Health Organization has long held that the coronavirus is spread primarily by large respiratory droplets that, once expelled by infected people in coughs and sneezes, fall quickly to the floor.

But in an open letter to the WHO, 239 scientists in 32 countries have outlined the evidence showing that smaller particles can infect people and are calling for the agency to revise its recommendations. The researchers plan to publish their letter in a scientific journal.

Technology and Pharmaceutical Solutions Suppliers Rather than Countries Should be the Guiding Force

Governments are by nature reactive whereas manufacturers are by nature proactive. A U.S. mask maker who expanded at the time of SARS was very prominent in making the case that reserve capacity was needed for future outbreaks. So the proactive aspect was working as needed. The reactive aspect which should have been funding from the U.S. government or at least an agreement with other governments to work together in future outbreaks was what was lacking.

The filtration industry is completely internationalized. Large American suppliers such as American Air Filter have been acquired by Daikin of Japan and Tri-Dim was acquired by German based Mann +Hammel and in turn Mann + Hammel is building large face mask lines in China (see article below).

This international cooperation has been becoming stronger for decades. McIlvaine was a guest speaker at the Filtration 2004 show in Shanghai. At the scheduled International Filtration Society 2020 exposition in San Diego (postponed) Chinese companies represented a large percentage of the exhibitors.

A search under China in the CTS shows that both purchasers and suppliers are international in their thinking. U.S. meat processors are owned by Chinese companies. Airlines fly around the world. Hotel chains have similar challenges in all the countries in which they operate. Automobile manufacturers have the same cabin air filter needs regardless of location.

Media and finished filter suppliers have been internationalizing rapidly over the last decade. The result is that governments try to control commerce. You have China forbidding 3M from exporting masks from its Chinese plants to the U.S. At the same time the U.S. is ordering 3M to provide all its masks to the U.S. regardless of where they are manufactured.

 

3M has been supplying masks the U.S. from its Chinese plant

McIlvaine Coronavirus Market Alert

... , and that 3M was complying. Earlier this week, it secured approval from China to export to the United States 10 million N95 respirators the company makes in China ...

Terms matched: 1  -  Score: 48  -  29 Apr 2020  -  URL: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/coronavirus/subscriber/Alerts/2020-04-06/20200406.html

Berry is a major media supplier with plants in Europe, China and the U.S.

McIlvaine Coronavirus Market Alert

... Expanding Meltblown Capacity Berry Switching to Mask Media at Plants in the U.S. and China Unique Process for Nanofiber Production and Microfiber Process Rates Fibertex Non Wovens has New HEPA ...

Terms matched: 1  -  Score: 45  -  29 Apr 2020  -  URL: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/coronavirus/subscriber/Alerts/2020-04-13/Alert_20200413.html

PFN is a global leading producer of nonwoven textiles with operations in Europe, USA and Africa. It was acquired by a Chinese company, Jofo Nonwovens making it a global supplier

McIlvaine Coronavirus Market Alert

... Includes Face Mask Line In Europe Jofo Nonwovens, based in Weifang, Shandong, China, will acquire PFNonwovens' Wuxi, China-based nonwovens operation. PFNonwovens acquired the operation ...

Terms matched: 1  -  Score: 29  -  2 Jun 2020  -  URL: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/coronavirus/subscriber/Alerts/2020-06-01/Alert_20200601.html

Many filter media companies have production sites in China as well as on several continents around the world.  Lydall reported that its Chinese facilities were up and running in the first quarter.  So world wide production has a number of advantages

McIlvaine Coronavirus Market Alert

... PPE. April volumes in the TAS business were down almost 90% . Our China sites were back in operation in the first quarter of 2020, while our European ...

Terms matched: 1  -  Score: 27  -  30 May 2020  -  URL: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/coronavirus/subscriber/Alerts/2020-05-29/Alert_202005029.html

Meat processors are major purchasers of technology to battle COVID.  Smithfield is one of the worlds largest meat processor and is based in the U.S. it was acquired by a Chinese company.  This is therefore an example of a purchaser will be making worldwide decisions  the same is true for hotel chains, restaurants and many other purchasers of technology

 McIlvaine Coronavirus Market Alert

... pork in Los Angeles. What it wants is to become the leading player in China." Smithfield's website further states that "Smithfield has not, does not, ...

Terms matched: 1  -  Score: 22  -  29 Apr 2020  -  URL: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/coronavirus/subscriber/Alerts/2020-04-16/20200416.html

 

The nature of COVID has been peaks and valleys by region. The demand worldwide is much steadier than the demand in any specific country or State within the U.S.  Just as the U.S. needs to have a nationwide policy the world through WHO, the UN and associations such as INDA, EDANA, WFS, ASHRAE, and NAFA needs one.

McIlvaine is reporting on the activities of these disparate groups in Coronavirus Technology Solutions. This effort should provide linkage for these organizations as well as for suppliers and users. Hopefully the U.S. position which has been dismissive of worldwide cooperation will change  In the following article Keith Bradsher of the NY Times provides considerable insight into the Chinese strategy. Considering, however, that there is a very big opportunity worldwide for Chinese companies, the ultimate cooperation of the government is likely.

China has been Preparing for COVID since 2005

Keith Bradsher, Shanghai editor for the NY Times has been working for many weeks on an article related to Chinese mask production It was published in the business section yesterday.  Bob McIlvaine was in contact with Keith throughout the process.  He has worked with Keith on other articles in the past. Keith details how China saw both a problem and an opportunity and has made the most of the situation.  Here are excerpts from the article.

“Before the pandemic, China already exported more respirators, surgical masks, medical goggles and protective garments than the rest of the world combined, the Peterson Institute for International Economics estimated.

Beijing’s coronavirus response has only added to that dominance. It increased mask production nearly 12-fold in February alone. It can now make 150 tons per day of the specialized fabric used for masks, said Bob McIlvaine, who runs a namesake research and consulting firm in Northfield, Ill. That is five times what China could make before the outbreak, and 15 times the output of U.S. companies even after they ramped up production this spring.

American companies have been reluctant to make big investments in fabric manufacturing because they worry that mask demand will be temporary. But Texas required on Thursday that most residents wear masks in public places, part of a broader embrace of face masks in recent days.

“It is a huge mistake to assume that the market will disappear,” Mr. McIlvaine said.

Ma Zhaoxu, vice minister of foreign affairs, said that from March through May, China exported 70.6 billion masks. The entire world produced about 20 billion all of last year, with China accounting for half.

In 2005, after the outbreak of SARS, which killed 350 people in China, the Ministry of Science and Technology announced that it had developed respirators that better fit Chinese faces. In 2010, the government’s five-year economic plan ordered a “focus on developing basic equipment and medical materials that have high demand, wide application and are mainly imported.”

China also foresaw the importance of nucleic acid test kits, which can detect coronavirus infections. In 2017, the Ministry of Science and Technology identified the kits as a “targeted development” industry.

The ministry’s decision was part of the country’s $300 billion “Made in China 2025” industrial policy to replace imports in many key industries, including medical devices. The ministry called for raising China’s share of the local market by 30 to 40 percentage points in each category of medical supplies.

Chinese makers of medical gear enjoyed generous government subsidies. Shenzhen Mindray, a maker of ventilators and other intensive care equipment, received up to $16.6 million a year over the past three years, according to company documents. Winner Medical, a mask manufacturer, received $3 million to $4 million a year. Guangzhou Improve, a producer of masks and test kits, received $2.5 million to $5 million a year.

Hospitals began to buy locally. Three years ago, the central government required purchasers to buy from domestic producers that could meet requirements. Local governments followed. Sichuan Province, for example, cut in half the number of categories for which medical equipment and supplies could be imported. Only the top hospitals could import anything, the provincial government said, while lower-ranked hospitals had to buy everything in China.

At least three other large, populous provinces — Liaoning, Hubei and Shandong — made similar announcements. 

Such efforts helped put China firmly at the front of the industry, as Rakesh Tammabattula discovered. An entrepreneur in the Los Angeles suburbs, he shifted his business making nutrition supplements and moisturizer to the production of medical masks and hand sanitizer in response to the epidemic. To do that, he needed a machine that could compress and cut fabric to make masks.
He discovered that the machines were made only in China. He had to charter a jet to fly the huge device — 36 feet long, six feet high and five feet wide — from southern China to Los Angeles.

“It’s not that we can’t make this,” said Mr. Tammabattula, the chief executive of QYK Brands. “It’s just that we haven’t focused on it.”

The Chinese government played a major role in this year’s medical-equipment build-out.

Sinopec, a state-owned Chinese oil company, said it had worked closely with the Chinese Communist Party as it set out to build a factory to make the particle-trapping fabric needed for surgical masks and respirators.

Officials also accelerated efforts to make land available for new factories. The city of Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province transferred 1.6 acres to the Jiande Chaomei Daily Chemical Company on Feb. 15 for an emergency expansion of respirator production. Lanxi, a county in Zhejiang, transferred land to the Baihao New Materials Company by the end of February for respirator production. Officials in Guangdong Province and the city of Jinan in Shandong Province approved more lenient land policies for medical supply businesses as well.

Government support for the medical supply industry is continuing. Guangzhou Aoyuan Biotech Company decided this year to expand from its usual business of making disinfectant into the manufacture of N95 masks. A top local official immediately visited the company, arranged land for it in an industrial park and approved all of the necessary forms.

A few economic policy experts in China contend that their country may be going too far. According to Tianyancha, a Chinese data service, more than 67,000 companies have registered in China this year to make or trade masks. Many start-ups with poor quality control have already run into trouble. The Chinese government has imposed increasingly stringent customs inspections on exports.

“Many mask-manufacturing enterprises — especially the small and medium enterprises that came into the picture much later and do not possess strong foundations — would have to face closure when they have a surplus of masks and profits begin to plunge,” wrote Cai Enze, a retired deputy mayor and economic planner in central China, in an essay in April. “That marks the start of a crisis.”

Still, the broader industry in China appears to be better prepared for the future.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/05/business/china-medical-supplies.html?smid=em-share

Mann + Hummel has Filter Cubes for Public Spaces and Even for Subways

Mann + Hummel has developed air filtration solutions for ambient air. The filter cube can be placed in any public space in addition to traffic intersections. So the value of the Filter Cube is increased with the additional advantage of eliminating COVID aerosols. 

According to the WHO, around 4.2 million people die each year worldwide from outdoor air pollution. The main cause is particulate matter, which can penetrate deep into the lungs and trigger illnesses. Nitrogen dioxide worsens allergies, damages the respiratory tract and can contribute to heart disease.

MANN+HUMMEL has been a filtration expert for 80 years. M+H research and development engineers continue to develop new methods to remove contaminants from air and liquids. Three years ago, they started specifically addressing the subject of fine dust in cities. They can also reduce high nitrogen dioxide emissions in places with high traffic volumes. Meanwhile, they clean more than 1.4 million m³/hour outdoors at 15 locations on three continents and project air purification in subway stations and other urban hotspots.

With fine dust filters for vehicles, we are getting closer to emission-free driving. Brakes, road, and tire abrasion are the biggest sources of fine dust from vehicles. Whether diesel or electric, MANN+HUMMEL can improve the emissions balance of vehicles and protect the vehicle occupants. 

The modular MANN+HUMMEL Filter Cube helps to improve air quality in places with high air pollution - such as traffic junctions or busy roads. Even in particularly sensitive areas such as schoolyards, playgrounds or food courts, the use of Filter Cubes helps to efficiently reduce air pollutants. The Filter Cube technology can also be integrated into existing infrastructure such as bus stops or billboards.

The decentrally applicable Filter Cubes are able to bind more than 80 percent of the nitrogen dioxide (NO₂), ozone (O₃) and fine dust contained in the ambient air that is drawn in. The core of the technology is a newly developed combifilter, which includes a filter layer that retains particulate matter. Due to the large surface area of the additional highly porous activated carbon media, NO₂ and O₃ is adsorbed very effectively at particularly low pressure drop and energy consumption.

Depending on the requirements, using a modular system means a number of Filter Cubes can be installed on top of each other to form a filter column. A filter column with three Filter Cubes is able to clean 14,500 m³ of air every hour. The Filter Cubes are equipped with an intelligent mechatronic system architecture. Available sensors record air and weather data as well as the pollution level and transfer the data to a cloud. This way the filter system controls itself depending on operating and environmental boundary conditions and thus saves energy costs since the fan is only running when it is needed.

The first step of the project is the investigation of the surrounding area, which has particularly high levels of pollutants. Whether it is an open area on a busy road, an inner courtyard of a business district or a relatively closed subway station, the experts make calculations for each of these conditions and consider different measures. They check where the fine dust and NO₂ pollution is highest and how the pollutants are spread through the air. Afterwards they determine how many Filter Cubes are needed and where they should be installed in the respective area. With the help of a simulation, these plans are determined internally and then checked by an independent engineering office.

A Filter Cube requires 1 m² of space and access to electricity. Depending on the location and customer requirements, a foundation and a data connection can be included. After the preparation of the infrastructure has been completed on site, the installation of the systems can begin. Thanks to an intelligent system architecture, the Filter Cube controls itself depending on the operating and ambient conditions. However, the operator can also control the units by remote control and access the system as required.

Mann+Hummel Supplying the HEPA Filter in the Ford-Produced Respirator

MANN+HUMMEL is supplying  the HEPA filter in the Ford-produced respirator, which will be worn by healthcare workers when treating COVID-19 patients. To date, MANN+HUMMEL produces, tests and ships 2,300 HEPA filter elements per day for this application, from their manufacturing sites in the USA and Germany.

The respirators are equipped with class H13 HEPA filters according to EN 1822 or the international norm ISO 29463. These filter classes are also used in operating rooms and in the pharmaceutical industry to reliably remove germs, viruses and microbiological contamination from the supply air. The European standard EN 1822 classifies HEPA filters and evaluates them according to their performance at the MPPS (Most Penetrating Particle Size). The micro-glass fiber media used in pharmaceutical/healthcare applications typically has an MPPS close to 0.2 μm.

"These critical times call for extraordinary actions and cooperation. Using our state-of-the-art HEPA filter production, in-house cleanroom test labs, and valued relationships with partners around the globe, we can blend our talents and expertise to help people in need. Our global teams have been working tireless to adapt to meet critical needs, with rapid development and time to market. I couldn’t be more proud of our team’s efforts to make a difference,” says Kurk Wilks, President & Chief Executive Officer of the MANN+HUMMEL Group.

With the acquisition of the European Vokes Air Group in 2014, Tri-Dim Filter Corporation in 2018 and Hardy Filtration in 2019, MANN+HUMMEL added almost 90 years of leading air filtration and cleanroom technology expertise as well as a state of the art HVAC and HEPA filtration portfolio to its unmatched portfolio of automotive and industrial filtration products and service. 

Large-Scale Production and Supply of Facemask Media

“MANN+HUMMEL has repeatedly demonstrated our competence in successfully transferring technology and know-how to new applications. We now use our filtration competence in automotive to build up and drive the production and supply of media for facemasks in our LS&E business segment. We have several groups in different countries all over the world working on this important initiative and we are extremely proud of their efforts,” says Kurk Wilks, President and Chief Executive Officer of the MANN+HUMMEL Group.

MANN+HUMMEL is in contact with several textile manufacturers for appropriate filter media inlay supply to upgrade textile mouth-nose masks, which leading textile manufacturers have started to produce.

In addition to filter media inlays, MANN+HUMMEL has implemented large-scale manufacturing of filter masks (daily protective grade) in the new MANN+HUMMEL Center of Manufacturing Operations in Kunshan, China, and is preparing the set-up of another production line for medical grade (FFP2 / N95) facemasks.

Manufacturing of filter masks (daily protective grade) in the new MANN+HUMMEL Center of Manufacturing Operations in Kunshan, China

Ultrafiltraton Membranes to Remove Multi Resistant Germs from Wastewater

There is evidence that COVID aerosols can be released from sewage wastewater. This makes developments by MICRODYN-NADIR of particular interest.

Micropollutants, multi-resistant germs and microplastics in treated waste water represent a danger for people and the environment. MANN+HUMMEL and its subsidiary MICRODYN-NADIR are meeting this challenge with modern membrane technology. A pilot project is showing the first results.

"In the past, one thought that if you can't see it, it can't hurt you. Today we know this is not true. In fact, the reverse is true." Werner Ruppricht is Senior Sales Director at MICRODYN‑NADIR, a subsidiary of MANN+HUMMEL with its headquarters in Wiesbaden. "The air contains harmful gases and particulates. Water contains micropollutants, multi-resistant germs and microplastics. They are not visible to the naked eye but can represent a big risk to the environment and human health", he explains.

Invisible but present everywhere. Microplastic particles are formed naturally as products made from plastic disintegrate or are created intentionally as ingredients for cosmetics and cleaning agents. The expression micropollutants also includes waste material from medicines and pesticides. Then, in addition, there are also multi-resistant germs which are formed and spread through the increased use of antibiotics in the breeding of animals and medicines. This all results in an additional health risk for people.

"These resistant germs, micropollutants and microparticles penetrate the waste water which is treated in sewerage plants via the water system. Conventional processes for the treatment of waste water, however, are unfortunately unable to efficiently separate these pollutants. Furthermore, sewerage plants are the ideal place for the multiplication and dissemination of multi-resistant germs", explains Ruppricht.

At the present time, the operators of sewerage plants usually use a process which is a combination of activated carbon and a sand filter located downstream to separate micropollutants. The activated carbon and the sand filter reduce the trace substances such as pharmaceutical residues and microplastics. But for multi-resistant germs they are not a barrier. In addition, the sand filter is not able to fully separate the activated carbon. As a result, it is able to partly enter and pollute the ambient air. The objective of the development from MICRODYN-NADIR is to remove this limitation of the process.

For some time now MICRODYN‑NADIR has been testing a new process in a pilot project in the municipal sewerage plant in Hünxe (North Rhine-Westphalia), which is a combination of activated carbon and immersed membrane filtration. The results have been positive, with the combination of activated carbon and the membrane stage able to retain trace substances, microplastics and activated carbon from the treated waste water. The use of ultra-filtration membranes which have a pore size a thousandth of the diameter of a human hair also allows researchers to separate germs. "The combination is a very efficient and economic alternative to conventional processes and is characterized by its considerably superior separation performance", explains Ruppricht. "The testing phase has already shown that our process meets the high requirements for the treatment of waste water and in particular sets new standards with regard to the separation of multi‑resistant germs. We are therefore able to make a valuable contribution to protect people and the environment."