FDA Approves Full-Scale Deployment of Battelle Sterilization Technology
On Sunday night, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Battelle, an Ohio-based non-profit science and technology research company, authorization to use its Battelle Critical Care Decontamination System to sterilize personal protective equipment (PPE) without a daily limit.
The Critical Care Decontamination System is the first of its kind, and can sterilize up to 80,000 pieces of PPE at one time. One unit is already on its way to New York City, while others scheduled for deployment in various hard hit cities, such as Seattle, Washington, D.C. and Chicago.
How It Works
From WOSU, which got an exclusive look at the new technology:
Hospitals will gather used PPE, and send it to the closest decontamination machine. A team of four Battelle scientists will put on protective gear and step inside the containers. The first chamber is an air lock, and the inner chamber sucks contaminated air from the container through multiple HEPA filters, and then out through a vent in the back.
Used N95 masks will be laid out on metal racks lining the walls. Other forms of PPE, like goggles, can be hung off of metal rods. Once the unit is full, the scientists will exit the main chamber into the airlock.
They will then spray themselves with ethanol to ensure they aren’t contaminated themselves, before exiting the entire container and sealing it tightly.
Scientists then begin the decontamination process, which uses vapor phase hydrogen peroxide.
For more information from FDA: https://www.fda.gov/media/136529/download
