
Ask HN: Sterilizing used N95 respirators with UVC light? - chuckledog
I&#x27;ve heard about the shortages in many countries of disposable N95 respirator masks.<p>Specifically, many hospitals are being forced to or will be forced to reuse their respirator masks.  They&#x27;re not designed for this, but it happens anyway due to limited supply.<p>I&#x27;m working on building something similar to<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;Light-Clean-Ozone-minutes-Capacity&#x2F;dp&#x2F;B07KWCQBKX&#x2F;ref=sr_1_4?keywords=uvc+sterilizer&amp;qid=1584471270&amp;sr=8-4<p>but for less money, using<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;gp&#x2F;product&#x2F;B00FB140TU&#x2F;ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&amp;psc=1<p>(basically an aquarium sterilizer bulb, which should have fairly good inventory).<p>I believe putting a respirator in such a sterilizer for 30m would be preferable to trying to sterilize it with liquid (which would likely ruin the mask) or to not sterilizing it at all (which apparently runs a good risk of reinfection).<p>My question: assuming this or a similar UVC-based sterilizer was cheap and readily available to health care facilities, would it be a good idea?<p>Disclaimer: I am a software engineer and definitely not a healthcare professional.  I have a little bit of biotech lab experience, and have not seen UVC light used in a biotech context for this sort of thing.
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chuckledog
OP comment: Here's a link that supports the idea
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4699414/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4699414/)

Also clickable links for the Amazon items mentioned in the post:

[https://www.amazon.com/Light-Clean-Ozone-minutes-
Capacity/dp...](https://www.amazon.com/Light-Clean-Ozone-minutes-
Capacity/dp/B07KWCQBKX/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=uvc+sterilizer&qid=1584471270&sr=8-4)

[https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FB140TU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FB140TU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1)

