Flight crews in China asked to wear NAPPIES in bizarre bid to prevent coronavirus spread via plane toilets
Flight crew in China are reportedly being asked to wear nappies in a strange bid to prevent the spread of COVID-19 on "high-risk" flights. Air chiefs in Beijing want cabin crew to be provided with disposable diapers so they don't have to use airplane bathrooms, The Sun reported. The bizarre recommendation was made by the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) for flights to and from countries where the rate of infection is higher than 500 people per million.
“It’s recommended that cabin crew wear disposable diapers and avoid using the lavatory unless in special circumstances to reduce the risk of infection," the CAAC notes in its newly updated list of coronavirus guidelines. The peculiar advice is listed under a section about the wearing of personal protective equipment (PPE) onboard the flight, according to Bloomberg.
That said, bathroom safety on commercial jets have been in discussion ever since the pandemic broke out earlier this year. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) suggested in June that toilet use should be restricted and passengers and crew should be assigned separate bathrooms. In fact, several airlines are working on innovative new measures to mitigate the spread of the virus via bathrooms.
According to a report by CNN, Japanese airline ANA recently announced it was testing a novel hands-free bathroom door. Meanwhile, Boeing secured a patent on a self-cleaning bathroom that uses UV light to kill 99.9 percent of germs after every use, Newsweek reported.
The new recommendation from China says crew should also wear "medical masks, double-layer disposable medical gloves, goggles, disposable hats, disposable protective clothing, and disposable shoe covers."
Other bizarre recommendations include using disposable curtains to divide the cabin into a “clean area, buffer zone, passenger sitting area, and quarantine area." Meanwhile, the three rows at the back of the plane should be an "emergency quarantine" zone, according to the new guidance.
It's worth noting that public toilets are deemed to be one of the riskiest places to catch the deadly virus.
Researchers wrote in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's journal Emerging Infectious Diseases how a South Korean woman likely contracted the virus when she used an airplane toilet during a flight from virus-hotspot Italy earlier this year. The team from Soonchunhyang University College of Medicine in Seoul, South Korea, claimed that the 28-year-old was among nearly 300 South Koreans who were evacuated from Milan, Italy, on March 31 when the pandemic was peaking in Europe.
Having said that, China's aviation industry, like several other countries, was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic early on, after the CCP regime ordered strict lockdowns and paused domestic travel and continued limited international travel. However, BBC News reported this summer that domestic flights in Chinese airports had already reached 86 percent of last year's levels. For those traveling in the U.S., the CDC recommends wearing a mask, getting a flu shot, avoiding close contact with others, and washing hands regularly. However, considering the rising cases and death rates, health experts have warned Americans to avoid all unnecessary travel. "The safest thing to do is to stay home," the CDC insists.