Health Ministry issues guidelines for re-use of goggles during COVID-19 fight

Union Health Ministry, on Wednesday, issued an advisory for re-processing and re-using of eye-protection goggles used by healthcare workers while treating those with coronavirus. The Ministry has asked healthcare workers to reuse the goggles at least up to five times till it gets damaged or is optically unclear.

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Ministry issues guidelines 

The standard operating procedure (SOP) issued by the ministry has laid down a number of instructions for reusing goggles, such as "goggles that conform to prescribed EN/BIS specifications will be re-used after disinfection", "reprocessing and reuse of goggles must be done only when it is dedicated to each individual", "air dry completely on a clean flat surface or by hanging in clean place", "use clean tissue papers gauge to dry it", eye protection must be discarded if damaged/rendered optically non-clear on repeated usage, etc.

"Goggles may be issued to each health care worker, who will decontaminate them after every use. Goggles to be disinfected by users and re-used at least five times each, whereby one pair of goggles will suffice for 6 days. They may use them rationally till their transparency decreases or they get damaged. The ratio of issue of goggles to coverall is recommended at 1:6," said an advisory issued by the ministry on the same.

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Earlier this week, the Health Ministry stated that India's recovery rate had surged to 41.61% from 7.1% in March. He highlighted that India's fatality rate of 2.87% was one of the lowest in the world. Aggarwal pointed out that only 10.7 cases per lakh population had been reported in India as against the global average of 69.9 cases. Similarly, he noted that India had witnessed 0.3 deaths per lakh population in contrast to 4.5 deaths per lakh population in the world. At present, there are 1,45,380 novel coronavirus cases in India out of which 60,491 patients have been discharged while 4,167 casualties have been reported. 

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Joint Secretary of Health MInistry Lav Aggarwal remarked, "Our recovery rate which was 7.1% in March has gone up to 41.61%. Our fatality rate is one of the lowest in the world reducing from 3.3% to 2.87%. If 69.9 cases per lakh population have been reported in the world, 10.7 cases per lakh population have been reported in India. The world has witnessed a 6.4% mortality rate. 4.5 deaths per lakh population have taken place globally while only 0.3 deaths per lakh population have been seen in India."

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