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Restrooms and Drinking Fountains: The most “Customer Facing” of all your Plumbing.
Some of the biggest risks for transmission of infection (COVID-19 or other microbial) are in restrooms. A regular flow of users touching the same handles on toilets, faucets, soap dispensers, paper towel dispensers, and entry doors can spread infection. Touchpoints can be addressed with touchless solutions or antimicrobial-treated handles and touchless surfaces.
Perhaps less obvious is the risk of contamination via splashing water from aerated faucets. We actually have an entire blog post entitled “Faucet Outlets: Aerators vs Laminar-Flow” that details the differences, but it comes down to this: air introduced via the aerator increases the potential for splashing, which increases the potential for user contact with contaminated water. This can be addressed using Laminar flow either in conjunction with offset drain sinks or on its own.
Restroom Systems Maintenance and Repairs:
If your facility has been shut down for an extended period of time, you will need to check your restrooms for several things:
Restrooms Protective Equipment:
Protective equipment runs a wide gamut, depending on your application. It can include everything from single-use PPE like over-shoe booties, masks, disposable coveralls, and rubber gloves to more permanent installation-based equipment, like 6-foot social distance markers on the floor or clear plastic dividers. When thinking about protective equipment for your specific application, consider where possible congestion and contamination risks are highest in the restroom.
Evaluate the best antimicrobial options for your application, whether antimicrobial-treated fixtures and handles, touch-less retrofit kits, or a full touch-less remodel, including flushometers, latches, toilet seats, faucets, soap dispensing, and hand drying.
Drinking Fountains:
Another significant risk for contamination is drinking fountains. In the best case, they are touched repeatedly on the handles. In the worst, the bubbler head may be touched by the mouths of potentially contagious users. To reduce this risk, drinking fountains can be replaced with water bottle filling stations. An inexpensive solution is to install bubbler head lockout devices, which will temporarily inhibit the use of the bubbler. At any time in the future, the lockout device can be easily removed, and bubblers will be usable again immediately. Don’t forget to replace all drinking fountain filters! Filters are an important protection against contaminants in the water and must be replaced regularly.
