Publications and Research
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
10-23-2016
Abstract
Theworld total of passenger cars is expected to go fromthe current one billion to >2.5 billion by 2050. Cars for domestic use account for ∼74% of the world’s yearly production ofmotorized vehicles. In North America, ∼80% of the commuters use their own car with another 5.6% travelling as passengers.With the current life-expectancy of 78.6 years, the average North American spends 4.3 years driving a car! This equates to driving 101 minutes/day with a lifetime driving distance of nearly 1.3 million km inside the confined and often shared space of the car with exposure to a mix of potentially harmful pathogens, allergens, endotoxins, particulates, and volatile organics. Such risks may increase in proportion to the unprecedented upsurge in the numbers of family cars globally. Though new technologies may reduce the levels of air pollution from car exhausts and other sources, they are unlikely to impact our in-car exposure to pathogens. Can commercial in-car air decontamination devices reduce the risk from airborne infections and other pollutants?We lack scientifically rigorous protocols to verify the claims of such devices. Here we discuss the essentials of a customized aerobiology facility and test protocols to assess such devices under field-relevant conditions.
Included in
Environmental Health Commons, Environmental Public Health Commons, Other Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health Commons
Comments
This article was originally published in The Journal of Environmental and Public Health, available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/1548326.
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.