Can N95 respirators be reused after disinfection? And for how many times?

Lei Liao; Wang Xiao; Mervin Zhao; Xuanze Yu; Haotian Wang; Qiqi Wang; Steven Chu; Yi Cui

COVID-19 is an ongoing pandemic with over a million confirmed cases and with new cases increasing by ~10% per day (at the time of writing), 1 that has caused major disruptions to nearly all facets of everyday life around the world. The disease is caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which was first detected in Wuhan, China. 2, 3 The virus is of likely zoonotic origin, and like the SARS-CoV, enters human cells via the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2). ACE2 is a membrane protein that is an entry point for coronaviruses found in the lungs, heart, kidneys, and intestines that is responsible for regulating vasoconstriction and blood pressure. It was found that the SARS-CoV-2 utilizes the ACE2 more efficiently than SARS-CoV, which may explain why the human-to-human transmissibility of the virus is so high. 4 Once infected, the patient will exhibit flu-like symptoms such as fever, chest tightness, dry cough, and in some cases development into severe pneumonia and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) [5] [6] [7] [8] . As the incubation period is around 3-4 days but can be as long as 20 days, along with the presence of asymptomatic carriers, the virus has been extremely difficult to contain 9 . While the initial mortality rate was estimated to be around 3.5% in China, compounding the longer incubation period and testing delays has led to new global estimates of around 5.7% 10 .