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The “New Normal”….What about the unlock?

By: Jon Greaves on May 5, 2020

On behalf of WCS Group, we hope that everyone and their nearest and dearest are safe and well. WCS Group continue to operate, keeping buildings, factories and our wonderful NHS operational in a safe and controlled manner. We would like to thank everyone involved for their hard work during these times.

Along with many of our industry colleagues and learned experts there is growing concern that any lack of clarity and enough time to facilitate a safe “unlock” of buildings and water systems may put additional pressure on the NHS.

We wrote a few weeks ago with wise words from Dr Paul McDermott when we were talking about the continued provision of WCS Group’s safety-critical services. At the time he wrote:

We’re all in admiration of those who are providing healthcare and in these types of services the support provided by companies like yours will be invaluable, ensuring that an already overburdened NHS is not stretched further by preventable infections. 

We believe these words to still be true and also now in a different context, if buildings are not released in a safe and controlled manner, we may well see a rise in Legionella cases in the UK in the forthcoming weeks and months.

On the 24th of April the Department for Education released advice on managing school premises during the Coronavirus outbreak but within this document stated:

Before resuming normal operation, commission a water treatment specialist to chlorinate and flush the complete system for all hot and cold water systems (including drinking water) and certify the water system is safe before the buildings are reoccupied. Allow sufficient time for this activity, approx. 1 week before opening if possible.

So, assuming that this task is completed as per the above, and assuming 75% of schools are closed or have mothballed areas and each school takes an average of ½ a day, there are c25,000 schools (that’s 9,375 activities in a week and 1,339 per day) which equates to a lot of planning to be done on top of normal workloads!

WCS Group are positioned to help all clients, existing and new, in their ongoing monitoring, mothballing or re-instatement of building water systems in a safe and controlled manner.

For further guidance on any of the above, please do not hesitate to contact your Account Manager or Info@wcs-group.co.uk

Topics: Legionella Control, Water Treatment & Hygiene

Jon Greaves

Written by Jon Greaves

Jon has progressively worked through operational roles, account management, technical management, and senior management roles over the last 16 years within one of the group companies before moving into the role of Water and Air Managing Director. Jon has experience across multiple sectors of water and air compliance, including district energy networks; data centres; healthcare; food and beverage and facilities management. Jon acted as a corresponding steering committee member on CIBSE CP1 – Heat Networks Code of Practice for the UK released in 2020.

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