Interventions to prevent surface transmission of an infectious virus based on real human touch behavior: a case study of the norovirus

• Published in: International journal of infectious diseases 2022-09, Vol.122, p.83-92
• Main Authors: Jin, Tianyi, Chen, Xuguang, Nishio, Masaya, Zhuang, Linan, Shiomi, Hiroyuki, Tonosaki, Yosuke, Yokohata, Ryoji, King, Marco-Felipe, Kang, Min, Fujii, Kenkichi, Zhang, Nan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Communicable Diseases; COVID-19; Disinfection; Fomite transmission; Human behavior; Humans; Norovirus; Restaurant; SARS-CoV-2; Surface disinfection; Surface touch
• ISSN: 1201-9712; 1878-3511
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijid.2022.05.047

•More than 380,000 seconds of data covering surface touch behaviors were collected.•In the restaurant, increasing touches on private surfaces would reduce virusexposure.•Virus intake fraction was reduced by 18.4% if public surfaces were not touched.•Washing hands was the most effective surface disinfection strategy.•Controlling human touch behavior was an effective strategy, but it was difficult to implement. Infectious viruses (e.g., SARS-CoV-2, norovirus) can transmit through surfaces. Norovirus has infected millions of individuals annually. Interventions on norovirus transmission in high-risk indoor environment are important. This study focused on a restaurant in Guangzhou, China. More than 41,000 touches by both diners and staff members were collected using video cameras. A surface transmission model was developed and combined with these real human touch behaviors to analyze the effectiveness of different norovirus prevention strategies. When the virus carrier was a diner, the virus intake fraction of diners in the same table was the highest. Increasing the touch frequency on personal private surfaces would reduce the virus exposure. The virus intake fraction was reduced by 18.4% on average if public surfaces were not touched. Optimization on surface materials could reduce the virus intake fraction by 86.6%. Additionally, disinfecting tablecloths, clothes of diners, and chairs were the three most effective surface disinfection strategies. Controlling human touch behavior (e.g., reducing the self-touches on mucous membranes) is more effective than surface disinfection in controlling norovirus transmission, but surface disinfection cannot be ignored because human behavior is difficult to be controlled.