Infection Resilience Environments: Buildings that keep us healthy and safe

The engineering community has come together to advise the Government and the public how to keep buildings safe as we reopen society

Throughout the pandemic, the world has struggled to control the transmission of COVID – especially in indoor spaces. The UK Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser has asked the engineering community to come up with solutions this pressing issue.

The Royal Academy of Engineering, through the National Engineering Policy Centre, has been commissioned to investigate effective and proven ways to build resilience to transmission of COVID and any future pandemics.

The findings of this initial report, which was produced with input from IMechE members with specific expertise in the field, give clear ways to ensure we can control the virus, continue building our economy and prevent humanitarian tragedies encompassing illness and death and overall disruption to our way of life – during COVID and after.

The report was originally published on the RAEng website on 16^th July 2021.

Ventilation is vital in reducing the spread of COVID-19 and a recent article in the journal Science called for major improvements to the quality of air in buildings. Not only is improved air quality critically needed for safer indoor spaces to protect occupants against pathogens, the quality of indoor air is also crucial to long term health and vitality of the workforce and residents of indoor spaces.

The IMechE has been developing a CPD course which aims to train people in line with latest thinking on indoor air quality, link it to increased productivity and reduced sick leave. It is compiled by subject matter experts at the forefront of their respective sectors and aims to give a comprehensive overview of the problems we are facing and offer insight on how to solve them.