MITIGATING RISKS OF LEGIONELLA OUTBREAK WITH RE-OPENING POSTCOVID-19 PANDEMIC

The global outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic has forced the closure, or the reduction of the use of, many large facilities, as hospital wards at an unprecedented scale. Now, as many communities start planning for re-opening after the lockdown, previously abandoned buildings need to be prepared and cleared from becoming a breeding area for legionella or a source of infection for Legionnaires' Disease (LD). Since LD attract up to 30% of sporadic cases of hospital-acquired pneumonia caused by legionellae and based on the literature reviewed, a multidisciplinary ‘communication model' is proposed as an approach for enhancing the capacity of the hospitals, or any similar buildings, to mitigate any potential risk from legionella during the stages of re-opening. The approach takes into consideration all the challenges of LD, the legionella bacterium and the water stagnation. The main implication of this paper is that it brings different disciplines together to mitigate any possibilities of co-infections coming from the legionella, especially for the most vulnerable patients.