Sat 12 December 2020:
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) released new guidelines for the country’s airline industry. contains advice about the best hygiene practices to carry out on aircraft and in airports.
China resumed most of its flights in August, this latest advice suggests far-from-ideal conditions for the cabin crew on board.
“The recommendation to use diapers and avoid in-flight bathrooms altogether applies on flights to and from countries with infection rates exceeding 500 cases per million people,” the Washington Post reported.
A section on PPE advises cabin crew on flights to and from high-risk countries to wear “medical masks, double-layer disposable medical gloves, goggles, disposable hats, disposable protective clothing, and disposable shoe covers.”
The next sentence reads: “It is recommended that cabin crew members wear disposable diapers and avoid using the lavatories barring special circumstances to avoid infection risks.”
Aviation has been one of the worst hit sectors by coronavirus, with many employees losing their jobs as airliners struggled to cope with the suspension of flights during the height of the outbreak and the subsequent drop in demand for travel.
Airplane bathroom design was already a hot topic before Covid-19, but the pandemic has focused efforts to come up with new solutions.
Japanese airline ANA announced earlier this year that it was testing out a prototype of a new hands-free lavatory door. Meanwhile, Boeing successfully applied for a patent on a “self-cleaning lavatory” that would use UV light to clean 99.9% of bathroom germs after every use.
Despite plane cabins ranking as “lower-risk” environments, doctors have reportedly “signaled that lavatories on long-haul flights are at a substantial risk of being contaminated with the coronavirus.”
