COVID-19 in the Built Environment
The COVID-19 pandemic presents an unprecedented challenge to public and private institutions to safely reopen public spaces, including workspaces and schools. However, we have little guidance on how to manage the use of shared spaces in light of a highly transmissible, but invisible, pathogen. The fundamental aim of this project is to better understand how SARS-CoV-2 spreads in built environments with an emphasis on the classroom setting.
What is Covid Code?
Covid Code comes from the idea of both the history and implementation of Fire Code and the use of digital algorithms to model how COVID-19 spreads in the built environment. Covid Code is meant to serve as a set of recommendations on how we can safely interact with the built environment and the presence of an infectious disease, such as SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19.
The fire code is a set of regulations put forth to put the safety of people first in the design and functionality of the built environment. Hundreds of years of fires and tragedies have led to increased education on how people interact with their spaces during a fire and how we can control, contain and prevent fires from harming human life and the buildings themselves.
After many businesses and schools were shut down in the beginning of 2020 as the result of the COVID-19 pandemic, many are now trying to balance the ability to take the necessary precautions to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 while being able to keep their businesses and schools open.
Covid Code will continue to update this website as a resource center for information on SARS-CoV-2 and the role it plays in the built environment.
Resources
Click here to learn more about different aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic. From the modes of transmission to different interventions in slowing the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Our Research
Click here to learn about our ongoing research on how SARS-CoV-2 is transmitted in the built environment and what precautions can be made to reduce and eliminate the spread of the virus.