A major cause for the Corona Mass break-out at the main plant of the meat company, Tönnies in Rheda-Wiedenbrück could be operating according to the Bonn-based Hygiene expert Martin Exner, the ventilation and cooling system in the cutting Department. “It is a newly recognized risk factor,” said Exner. It has not been known that aerosols can may be held to be spread on the Virus through ventilation systems in motion.
Pure Burger
Political correspondent in North Rhine-Westphalia.
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Exner’s findings are far-reaching, are likely to have consequences for all other meat establishments, and also other parts of the food industry. Many companies can expect to have their ventilation systems are now retooling. For the newly recognized Problem, there is as yet no statutory regulation, said Exner. In the case of infection it is necessary to learn still a lot of pathogens such as the Coronavirus, “in order to make the transfer because of regulations”.
In the part of the operation in the case of Tönnies had the Virus spread in the past few weeks, unnoticed at first. It has now been established at approximately 1500 employees with an infection. Rheda-Wiedenbrück is currently the largest Corona-the Hotspot in Germany. Exner, who is the Director of the Institute for Hygiene and public health of the University of Bonn, had gone on Saturday and Sunday in the order of the circle Gütersloh in the case of Tönnies to search for causes. He was also involved in the so-called Heinsberg-study, when it came, the rapid virus spread during a carnival session trace. Exner had found out that the air in the room had been processed by the air conditioner with only 20 to 30 per cent fresh air and the used Filter was not able to the Virus in the circulation of the air to hold back.
Similar to the findings from the Exner on Wednesday afternoon, together with the district administrator Sven-Georg Adenauer (CDU) presented. Exner said in the cutting Department of a Slaughterhouse, the air will be cooled to 6 to 10 degrees Celsius. At the same time, the workers have to disassemble at high speed and under hard physical stress of the animals slaughtered. In order to keep the temperature low, will pulled the air from the room, cooled and returned to the room to be prepared. Exner proposed high performance filters and UV-radiation as a solution.
The researchers has now been commissioned, the findings of a working group, together with scientists from the Robert Koch-Institute and the NRW centre for health, processing and technical solutions.
