Think you don’t need to worry about COVID-19 while using a public restroom? A group of researchers from Yangzhou University in China recently reported that flushing public restroom toilets can release clouds of virus-laden aerosols for you to potentially inhale.
If that’s not cringeworthy enough, after running additional computer simulations, they’ve concluded that flushing urinals does likewise. In Physics of Fluids, the group shares its work simulating and tracking virus-laden particle movements when urinals are flushed.
The researchers’ work clearly shows public restrooms can be dangerous places for potentially becoming infected from a virus, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Other work has shown that both feces- and urine-based virus transmission is possible.
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