Want to stop disease from spreading? Open a window

Tuesday, February 27th, 2007

Want to stop disease from spreading? Open a window:

Preventing the spread of disease in a hospital may be as simple as opening a window, an international team of researchers reported on Monday.

The low-tech solution could help prevent the spread of airborne infections such as tuberculosis — and ironically, old-fashioned hospitals with high ceilings and big windows may offer the best design for this, they reported.

They worked better than modern “negative pressure” rooms, with expensive design aimed at pumping out infected air, the researchers report in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.

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