Does Coronavirus live on Paper?

Cloudwatcher · Post by **Cloudwatcher** » 26 Mar 2020, 21:27

Someone in our bookclub just told us all not to buy books because Coronavirus lives on paper for 2 days. To which I said:

Errrr that's the least of my worries because everyone in our sorting office handles hundreds/thousands of paper letters every day so that would mean that

Pretty much everyone at Royal Mail has Coronavirus and that we are delivering Coronavirus into everyone's homes. Hardly anyone at our sorting office is wearing gloves.

I hope its not true?

To be honest its hard to separate fact from fiction on the internet because this virus is new and its all happened so quickly that the internet is full or rumour and gossip and its hard to find the facts.....

sindba · Post by **sindba** » 26 Mar 2020, 21:35

Yes it does.

The amount of time is uncertain, but probably days. Don't look on "the internet". Just stick to trusted sorces - the NHS, the World Health Organisation, BBC etc.

Gloves do very little to protect you (the virus lives there, same as your hands). Unless you wash them or change them frequently - ideally every time you touch something.

Post by **POSTMAN** » 26 Mar 2020, 22:09

On BBC news they have a regular Q&A thing, one was on the mail, what the scientist bloke on there said was recent studies showed that paper and cardboard soak up the virus rapidly and then gets inactivated.

The question was do customers need to use gloves to open up the mail, the answer was no.

Hard surfaces could be up to 72hrs.

Just pointing it out, it's still a worry obviously but you also need to keep doing that hand washing don't touch your face thing as much as possible regardless.

Post

Royal Mail say...

Q. Is it safe to handle mail?

A. Yes. Public Health England (PHE), the key health authority, has advised that people handling letters and parcels are not at risk of contracting the coronavirus.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has also advised that coronaviruses do not survive long on objects, such as letters or parcels.

Q. Is it safe to handle mail without hand sanitiser?

A. Yes. PHE has advised that people receiving parcels are not at risk of contracting the coronavirus. They should continue to wash their hands more often than usual using soap and hot water. The hand soap that we provide is effective for hand washing and good hand hygiene.

ssdd · Post by **ssdd** » 26 Mar 2020, 22:17

Yes, there are too many different opinions and nothing concrete. I assume that all mail I'm handling is potentially contaminated.

The only saving grace I see is that because the items are handled quickly with a small 'fingerprint', there shouldn't be high amounts of any virus lingering there. That's not counting anything that's been coughed or sneezed on. There's some evidence that higher doses of exposure to the virus can lead to higher chance of contracting illness.
Here's a link that explains this further:

https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expe ... iral-load/

Nothing to worry about as long as you don't touch your face before washing/sanitising your hands. If you do have to scratch, at least use a part of your arm that has had less exposure to other sources of potential contamination.

I personally feel that you're more at risk by being in close proximity to someone else with it, rather than from surfaces. Another article for comparison:

https://m.economictimes.com/magazines/p ... 690737.cms

These are just my opinions based on various articles read and should not be taken as advice.

exetererica · Post by **exetererica** » 27 Mar 2020, 13:17

Woody Guthrie · Post by **Woody Guthrie** » 27 Mar 2020, 13:32

exetererica wrote:The answer should be a definitive yes or no.

No ambiguity, ifs, buts or assuming.

This is not a game.

The reason there isn't a definitive answer is because it depends on too many factors including but not limited to the type of paper, the amount of virus deposited, the air temperature and humidity.
If someone deposited it 5 minutes ago of course it's going to be live, how long after that depends on all those (and more) variables.

Treat it like any other surface, assume it's contaminated, wash your hands and don't touch your face.

Post by **SpacePhoenix** » 27 Mar 2020, 13:56

In any MC or MPU isn't there the chance that there could be particles of the virus in the air, you just need to look at the amount of dust inside a machine at the end of a shift?

Woody Guthrie · Post by **Woody Guthrie** » 27 Mar 2020, 14:22

SpacePhoenix wrote:In any MC or MPU isn't there the chance that there could be particles of the virus in the air, you just need to look at the amount of dust inside a machine at the end of a shift?

Of course there is.
All guidance is based on level of risk.
The risk of you picking up a virus in any scenario is never absolute zero but we can't live in disinfected bubbles.

ssdd · Post by **ssdd** » 27 Mar 2020, 16:22

Just to add another recent article that suggests you may be more at risk from airborne particles than from contaminated surfaces:
https://www.newscientist.com/article/22 ... nfect-you/

Post by **POSTMAN** » 27 Mar 2020, 16:27

Let's not Google too much there will always be different ish answers depending on who writes it or when it is written.
Social distance and the washing thing are all you can do in our circumstances, if someone is coughing and sneezing to s**t near you move away.

Lets be honest this thing has been going on for months, it's not as if tens of thousands of posties around the world have been affected, and we have not affected millions of customers in the process.

Fingers crossed.

Postie45 · Post by **Postie45** » 27 Mar 2020, 17:29

It can live up to 24hrs on cardboard... This is the threshold we should be worried about, will RM hold back mail a day to safeguard us ? Will they f**k !!

Cloudwatcher · Post by **Cloudwatcher** » 27 Mar 2020, 20:19

OK thanks everyone. Interesting to know. The truth is probably in the middle somewhere, the virus might linger a bit, but as you say nowhere near as much as someone coughing in your face.

Good advice to not touch face until thoroughly washed hands. I now have a sign just inside my front door at home to wash hands mostly to remind myself.

I'm still going to work and feeling fine. Just being careful to keep my distance when giving parcels to customers so as to reduce the chance of infecting them especially if they are older.

Post by **SpacePhoenix** » 27 Mar 2020, 20:21

Postie45 wrote:will RM hold back mail a day to safeguard us ? Will they f**k !!

If they did it'd have to be stored in DOs, many MC wouldn't have the room to store it

sindba · Post by **sindba** » 27 Mar 2020, 20:25

SpacePhoenix wrote:
Postie45 wrote:will RM hold back mail a day to safeguard us ? Will they f**k !!
If they did it'd have to be stored in DOs, many MC wouldn't have the room to store it

Not if they stopped all non-essential collections.

NHS, PO, boxes, Local Authorities, Pharmacies. That's it.

No D2D, no DSA, no Amazon (apart from test kits).

Postie45 · Post by **Postie45** » 27 Mar 2020, 21:05

sindba wrote:
SpacePhoenix wrote:
Postie45 wrote:will RM hold back mail a day to safeguard us ? Will they f**k !!
If they did it'd have to be stored in DOs, many MC wouldn't have the room to store it
Not if they stopped all non-essential collections.

NHS, PO, boxes, Local Authorities, Pharmacies. That's it.

No D2D, no DSA, no Amazon (apart from test kits).

exactly, these are extraordinary circumstances yet nothing *really* is being done that helps manage the workload. We have less staff and those that are at work are having to take extra time sucking procedures to help prevent the spread.