The properties of hot household hygroscopic materials and their potential use for non-medical facemask decontamination

Mathieu Métifiot (1) , Marie-Line Andreola (1) , Frédéric Becquart , Wahbi Jomaa (2) , Paul O Verhoeven , Gerard Baldacchino , Simon Hemour

1 MFP - Microbiologie Fondamentale et Pathogénicité
2 I2M - Institut de Mécanique et d'Ingénierie

The wide use of facemasks through the population to prevent SARS-CoV-2 virus transmission, and its resulting mis- or even non-decontamination are challenging the management of the epidemic at a large scale. As a complement to machine-wash that wastes significant amount of water and energy, hot hygroscopic materials could be used to decontaminate non-medical facemasks in household settings. We report the inactivation of a viral load on a facial mask for an exposure of 15 minutes, with the combined effect of heat and humidity under a decaying pattern suggesting straight-forward general public deployment towards a reliable implementation by the population.

Mots clés: M-L.A.; Author contributions: M-L.A.; W.J.; P.V.; G.B.; and S.H. designed research; and S.H. performed research; and S.H. analyzed data; F.B.; and S.H. wrote the paper

Domaines: Virologie

Mathieu Métifiot, Marie-Line Andreola, Frédéric Becquart, Wahbi Jomaa, Paul O Verhoeven, et al.. The properties of hot household hygroscopic materials and their potential use for non-medical facemask decontamination. 2020. ⟨hal-03048607⟩