Laughter not best medicine after all
Source: Agencies |
January 11, 2011, Tuesday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
DO you know how far your sneeze goes? Or if you can stop germs from spreading by cupping your mouth with your hand when you cough? Or that laughing is a surprisingly effective way of spreading infection?
With a giant mirror and high-speed camera, scientists in Singapore are trying to find out how airborne transmission of flu viruses takes place, or if it happens at all.
The equipment allows them to observe real-time a person's spray of minute liquid droplets when coughing, sneezing, laughing and talking, and they hope the results can be used to make better guidelines for infection control.
"It's really to inform infection control teams, because there is controversy now about which pathogens, like flu, are airborne and if so, how significant this route is compared to others, such as direct contact," said team leader Julian Tang, a -virologist and consultant with Singapore's National -University Hospital.
While it is likely a flu sufferer can infect others by coughing or sneezing, little is known about the distances a cough or sneeze travels and the volume of air - and viruses - packed into it.
Infection control guidelines are mostly based on modelling studies and expert estimates, not hard scientific data.
In their S$1.08 million (US$833,000) study, funded by the National Medical Research Council of Singapore, Tang and colleagues designed a concave mirror, like those used in astronomical telescopes.
From images seen so far, whistling and laughing -appear to spread infection very effectively.
"Laughing produces a surprisingly strong, diffuse, exhaled plume, and I suspect that singing will produce an even stronger, more penetrating plume," Tang said.
"However, whether they will lead to infection and disease depends on other factors, such as virus survival and host immune responses - which other teams are studying."
With a giant mirror and high-speed camera, scientists in Singapore are trying to find out how airborne transmission of flu viruses takes place, or if it happens at all.
The equipment allows them to observe real-time a person's spray of minute liquid droplets when coughing, sneezing, laughing and talking, and they hope the results can be used to make better guidelines for infection control.
"It's really to inform infection control teams, because there is controversy now about which pathogens, like flu, are airborne and if so, how significant this route is compared to others, such as direct contact," said team leader Julian Tang, a -virologist and consultant with Singapore's National -University Hospital.
While it is likely a flu sufferer can infect others by coughing or sneezing, little is known about the distances a cough or sneeze travels and the volume of air - and viruses - packed into it.
Infection control guidelines are mostly based on modelling studies and expert estimates, not hard scientific data.
In their S$1.08 million (US$833,000) study, funded by the National Medical Research Council of Singapore, Tang and colleagues designed a concave mirror, like those used in astronomical telescopes.
From images seen so far, whistling and laughing -appear to spread infection very effectively.
"Laughing produces a surprisingly strong, diffuse, exhaled plume, and I suspect that singing will produce an even stronger, more penetrating plume," Tang said.
"However, whether they will lead to infection and disease depends on other factors, such as virus survival and host immune responses - which other teams are studying."
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