Air cleaner claims to eliminate viruses in 10minutes

A new study by the Virus Research Centre at Sendai Medical Center and QleanAir Japan  points to the health benefits of air purifiers in the home.

While it has long been understood that such devices can offer significant protection against emissions and pollution types like particulate matter, understanding their effectiveness at fighting viruses and bringing infection rates down hasn’t always been so clear.

This latest work is intended to clarify that. Focusing on the QleanAir FS 30 air cleaner, researchers found this model was successful at removing 95% of all airborne virus particles within a 10minute timeframe, with 99.9% removed around the 20minute mark. This compares to particle reduction through natural airflow – i.e. without a cleaner – of 16.9%.

Undertaken in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, when indoor air quality and safety rose to the top of the public agenda, while that crisis is widely seen to have passed its peak in terms of the need for social distancing and disrupting transmission, this research could prove vital in the future. Simply put, future airborne pandemics are highly likely.

‘The study shows what difference an air cleaner equipped with a high-performance, certified mechanical filter can have on air quality. We also found that the QleanAir FS 30 equipped with an EPA 11 filter performed slightly better than the HEPA 14, but that the performance of the air cleaner is decisive to indoor air quality,’ said Glen Shimizu, Head of Sales Japan and MD at QleanAir Scandinavia K.K.

‘The fact that our technology can clean air in as short a time as 10minutes can mean a significant difference in sensitive environments with high demands on the air quality such as hospitals, schools, offices, and hotels,’ added Sebastian Lindström, CEO at QleanAir. 

Earlier this week, Air Quality News published an op-ed by Professor Guy Marks, who calls for lessons from Covid-19 to inform policies that can usher in the safe air decade.

Image: Viktor Forgacs