Many organizations are beginning to implement plans to return to offices, schools, and other common areas. The COVID-19 pandemic has everyone reconsidering communal spaces to minimize risk, especially the all too common open-office space concept. Some employers and business owners are creating new safety-related jobs, such as safety managers and care coordinators, to keep employees safe, while some are simply re-arranging the desks to keep employees at a healthy distance. Many employers, however, are turning to simulations to examine how to best reconfigure office designs and HVAC to lessen the chances of transmission.
Some office of emergency management (OEM) organizations have recently proposed new layout ideas, such as implementing partition walls between desks, to create better separation. The above-mentioned solution is effective only if we assume that the affected person always stays in the same position with absolutely no movement. There is no measurable way to know where the employee will be sitting, standing, or walking at the time of the sneeze or cough and, furthermore, it is impossible to know where and in what direction the sneeze or cough would travel. Since COVID-19 can be carried as particles in the airflow, it’s crucial to understand the supply and return ventilation paths.