VANCOUVER, British Columbia--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Newly published research in the journal Public Health Practice shows that a weekly program of nasal photodisinfection implemented at a major Western Canada meat packing plant, alongside standard safety measures recommended by the US Centre for Diseases Control and Prevention (“CDC”), reduced the expected COVID-19 positivity rate by over 99%, from 1,344 expected positive PCR tests to 3 positive PCR tests out of over 21,000 administered tests over a seven-month period.
Meat processing plants worldwide experienced a disproportionately greater incidence of COVID-19 than surrounding communities, despite implementing safety precautions.
The extraordinary reduction in the COVID-19 positivity rate permitted the plant to continue to operate without shutdown or disruption. Authors also noted that COVID-19 rates were lowered in populations surrounding the plant, potentially as a result of reduced transmission from the large worker population to the community. The voluntary, five-minute treatment was well received by the workforce, with a compliance rate of over 75% by the end of the seven-month study. No serious side effects from nasal photodisinfection were reported.
Professor Richard Rusk from the University of Manitoba and a joint author of the paper commented:
“This study suggests that nasal photodisinfection can provide safe and effective SARS-CoV-2 viral suppression when deployed in an industrial workplace setting. Outcomes of the study demonstrated significant reduction of COVID-19 rates compared to surrounding community rates, implying substantially reduced acute and long-term illness, disability, and death rates in plant employees. The intervention proved safe with repeated weekly administrations and was easy to implement and well received by the workforce. This has strong positive implications for viral outbreak suppression in other industries and employee demographics across the world.”
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About Ondine Biomedical Inc.
Ondine Biomedical Inc. is a Canadian headquartered life sciences company that is the leader in photodisinfection therapies. Ondine has a pipeline of investigational products, based on its proprietary photodisinfection platform, in various stages of development. Products beyond nasal photodisinfection include treatments for a variety of medical indications such as chronic sinusitis, ventilator-associated pneumonia, burns, and other indications.