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Here in the UK we stand at the forefront of international equine breeding, and the sector provides almost 20,000 jobs to the economy. When a disease raises its ugly head horses have to be isolated and can’t compete. The last thing you need is a disease on the premises. A major outbreak of equine flu had serious implications for horses and their owners, followed by an equally serious outbreak of equine herpes virus that prevented almost 4000 horses from competing, blocked on the Federation Equine International list. It also led to international competitions being shut down in twelve EU nations. So it’s great to know UVC technology comes with all sort of benefits for the equine industry, keeping facilities safer for the horses themselves as well as for the people who care for and work with them. Here’s how our brilliant UVC tech will help future-proof your equine business while your competitors struggle. UV Sanitization for equine businesses Our simple, low cost, highly effective UVC tech can be used to sanitize high traffic areas and high touch areas, places like offices and show facilities. A mobile room UV sterilizer might be your best choice to kill bacteria, moulds and viruses across the premises, or one or more fixed units of different types. You might find a unit fixed inside the ventilation and air conditioning ducts will make a big difference, or you might go for a combination. You can fit our UVC sanitization units in any room where you want to disinfect the air and surfaces. UVC lamps at the right wavelength will disinfect a room in just a few minutes to give you a safer premises, a place with reliably pathogen-free air. The rays eliminate 99.9% of bacteria, viruses, moulds and other threats to human and horse health. Turn the units on and they start killing pathogens instantly. Equine biosecurity for stables Horse-led businesses face a constant risk of infectious diseases, particularly those transmitted via aerosol pathogens like Equine Influenza, Equine Herpes virus and Streptococcus Equi, also called Strangles. The tech also benefits horse quarantine facilities. While there isn’t a lot of research about UVC light’s ability to kill off equine-specific strains of herpes and flu, there’s a wealth of studies, evidence and research revealing how well UVC light inactivates viruses, bacteria and fungi in general, and human forms of flu and streptococcus. There’s absolutely no scientific reason to think it doesn’t have the same impact on horse diseases. Your equine business is unique – and so is our solution Our units give you a convenient way to expose enclosed areas where horses gather and live to the UVC light that kills equine diseases. Every project is unique so the first step is to establish exactly what you need at your place, something we do as a matter of course. Once you’ve eliminated aerosol and surface pathogens, the risk of them spreading from human to horse and horse-to-horse plummets. UV light complements your physical cleaning perfectly, too. You can shine it on grooming tools, tack and feed buckets as well as surfaces and the air, so they don’t end up becoming disease carriers. All of our devices create a controlled UVC zone where the air is continuously disinfected, and because they’re designed with safety in mind neither horses nor humans can be over exposed to the light. Equine business? Make the premises even safer for horses and people Give us a call if you’d like to know more about how UVC will keep your business going when others are forced to stop until an equine disease runs its course. We think you’ll find it an inspiring conversation.

Schools and childcare settings are particularly vulnerable to infections. So what can you do to minimise the spread of infectious illnesses at your childcare setting or school? Kids spend a lot of time mixing closely with other children in places like childcare, pre-school nurseries, and schools. If one child catches a cold, norovirus, scarlet fever, salmonella, chicken pox, covid, flu or anything else, everyone else catches it in record time, along with the teachers and auxiliary staff like cooks, cleaners and caretakers. Spread by direct contact between children via food, by touching infectious surfaces or breathing in infected air droplets, a wave of something as simple as a bad cold can send a school or nursery into a rough spin. In a world where time is money, illness in childcare settings can quickly have a dramatic impact on the business’s finances. Very young children - infants and toddlers – are the most likely to use their hands to wipe their noses or rub their eyes before handling toys or touching other children, sending a virus from the nose or eyes of one child via hands or toys to the next child and so on. Because children get sick a lot in the first several years of life naturally, as their bodies build immunity to infections, the risk of a business-limiting illness is particularly high in childcare settings. There isn’t always space to keep a poorly child separate from the others while their parents are on the way to pick them up. If several children get ill at once it can be very difficult to cope without it spreading faster and further. Even with sensible prevention measures, it’s likely some infections will spread anyway. The current surge of whooping cough, with cases at a ten year high, is leading officials to advise people to stay away from work and children away from school if they’re infected. In Bulgaria a serious flu epidemic is closing schools, which are pivoting to online learning like they did during covid. Invasive Strep A infections are on the rise right now in some countries, mumps in others. And covid is making itself felt in Scotland, sending teachers off sick as well as pupils. All this means it’s wise to do everything possible to protect your childcare business or school from infectious bacteria and viruses, years, moulds and spores. Luckily there’s an excellent way to do it without breaking the bank, with ongoing energy costs that are surprisingly low. It’s UV light disinfection, and it’s a business-saver. UV light disinfection for schools The best way to use UVC disinfection tech in schools is to use it in the rooms where the different school years mix. This has proved very effective in stopping illnesses and infections from spreading to every age group. Bringing UVC into play in shared spaces like gyms, IT rooms, language labs and canteens has an impressive impact. Chris Roe RCN RGN is the Chief Medical Officer for a large prestigious boarding school called Willow Park in Dublin, where primary schools feed children into the senior school. As he says, “Our top priority in opening the school in September 2020 was the safety of our students and staff. My office was identified as one of our main priorities due to the volume of students and staff that would come through daily. After installation of our fixed UV fitting, I easily felt more comfortable being able to blast the room multiple times during the day between patients. We did also introduce portable UV systems to clean the classrooms in the school and it has been a great addition to our sanitising process. Although I do not have the exact numbers, I do believe that not only did the purifier help with no outbreaks of COVID 19, but there was also a reduced number of stomach bugs and colds and flus in general. The team has always supported us with any technical issues and had a rapid customer response”. Feel free to get in touch . We’ll be pleased to discuss how to keep the pupils at your school safe from pathogens.

Climate change isn’t just affecting the way we heat and cool our homes. It’s also predicted to drive an increase in diarrhoea outbreaks. It’s just one of many stories cropping up that highlight the importance of the best possible food hygiene and food system disinfection protocols. Let’s see what’s happening, and what we recommend to keep food sector businesses and their products safe and hygienic. How campylobacter loves heat Campylobacteriosis infection causes diarrhoea and stomach pains, and the main transmission route is food. A team from the University of Surrey says the campylobacter food poisoning bacterium will spread faster as the climate warms, but they’re not 100% sure why. It matters because campylobacter is one of the four biggest global causes of diarrhoeal diseases in the world. The team analysed data from around a million cases in England and Wales collected over two decades. Then they mapped the findings to the weather over the same period. The results revealed that while the disease turns up consistently below 8C, every 5C rise creates a dramatic hike in infection rates. The same goes for humidity. Once it reaches 75-80% humidity, infection levels soar. The theory is that warm weather simply boosts the survival and spread of pathogenic bacteria. The way people socialise more when it’s hot also has an effect. Luckily, however hot and sticky it gets, our UVC disinfection units kill campylobacter stone dead in no time. Say you run a cafe or restaurant. This is the kind of UV light hygiene units you might need: Cubical surface and air for the toilets, ceiling units or our mobile for the whole restaurant at the end of each working day.. The FSA and NFU warn about poisoned imported food The UK Food Standards Agency is worried about a rise in food poisoning linked to some imported products, a concern mirrored by Food Standards Scotland and the UK Health Security Agency. They’re all warning us to take more care than usual over handling and cooking imported poultry and related products thanks to a hike in food poisoning. The warnings are in response to a sharp increase in Salmonella enteritidis linked to poultry products from Poland, and negotiations are already underway to improve the safety of the imported goods to protect people’s health. The idea is that we should never allow sub-standard imported food into the UK. In the meantime people need to take extra care over the cooking instructions on food packaging, cook food at the right temperature and right amount of time, ensure surfaces and equipment that contact food are clean, and wash hands regularly. The FSA is also asking local authorities to remind food businesses about the importance of good hygiene. Whatever foods or ingredients used by your food sector business, we have a powerful, affordable UV light disinfection unit that’s perfect for your premises. Get in touch to find out the perfect way to keep your premises clean and safe for employees and your food safe for the people who ultimately eat it. Say you have a complex production line. How might you best use UV disinfection to keep your people working and your products safe to eat? Just and investment of £ 3-4 K can keep your premises safe. The beautiful game – poisoned! An important football match has been cancelled because of food poisoning. 14 players and 4 staff were struck down before the Wolverhampton Women’s Birmingham Challenge Cup semi-final with West Bromwich Albion on Sunday. The team couldn’t even train because of the outbreak, which floored the majority of players and staff members. Apparently the cause was a ‘dodgy meal’ the team had after their match with Reading the previous week. The thing is, food poisoning doesn’t just affect the people made ill, it also impacts the bottom line of both clubs, which have lost the income they would have made from spectators. It sounds like the business that provided the contaminated food could do with improved sanitation measures. Just one of our units could have made all the difference, at a cost that doesn’t break the bank: Contact us to see how UVC light will keep the food you create, prepare and serve safer for consumers.

As a rule the older we get, the less effective our immune system is in the first place. When we’re seriously ill or suffer from certain diseases, it can be badly damaged. No wonder so many of us lost people we love in care homes during the covid pandemic. The virus that left many younger people with no more than a sniffle proved a catastrophe for the elderly and vulnerable. The dedicated people who run care homes understand the risks, and they’re taking steps to prevent a covid-like tragedy from happening again. At the same time money is tight and profit margins are being eaten away by the cost of living and energy price crises. Luckily the best solution to care home hygiene doesn’t involve costly things like employing more cleaners, cleaning more frequently, or buying ever-more powerful disinfectants and cleaning chemicals. It simply involves clean, safe ultraviolet light at a special wavelength that kills health threats in mere minutes. Affordable, cheap-to-run ultraviolet hygiene for care homes UVC light has a profound effect on viruses, bacteria, moulds, spores and more, damaging the RNA and DNA inside them so badly they can’t reproduce, which means they can’t spread and can’t make people ill. The UVC light shines on surfaces as well as cleaning the air. Clean air is particularly important in care homes because the windows are often shut to help stop residents feeling the cold, even in good weather. So it’s vital to keep the whole care home clean and germ-free. Care home owners still have to carry out essentials like washing clothing, bedding and towels, but vital tasks like cleaning communal areas, bathrooms, loos and dining rooms, residents’ rooms, surfaces and equipment are made faster and a whole lot easier thanks to ultraviolet hygiene. It’s surprising where pathogens can gather. As every care home manager knows there are threats everywhere, which is why disinfecting things as disparate as soft furnishings, photo frames, DVD players, landline telephones and even mobile phones is important. An example of a popular UV disinfection unit for care homes In some care home contexts a fixed UVC hygiene unit will do a top job of killing pathogens. Our Upper Air Germicidal Units (UVGI), for example, is an easy-to-fit UVC LED Steriliser Unit that provides impressive Indirect Fixed Air Sterilisation. This particular upper air steriliser is safe to have on constantly, disinfecting the upper air that’s naturally circulated to protect people in the area. Perfect for shared spaces like care home TV rooms and dining rooms, they’re simply installed above people’s heads to stop the cross contamination of viruses and germs, dramatically cutting the viral load across the air and providing constant clean air. Our X Series is available as 600mm or 300mm square ceiling tiles, an industry standard size to fit almost every existing light fitting. The X1 model uses convection for continuous air disinfection and the X2 model uses mechanical extraction to provide silent air circulation. The X3 integrates surface and air sterilisation with direct ‘line of sight’ disinfection while the space isn’t occupied, along with continuous upper air disinfection, making it ideal for toilets and other small spaces where people don’t spend much time. How much are UV disinfection units for care homes? These UVC ceiling fittings don’t use any chemicals. There’s no ozone. They’re sustainable, cost very little to run thanks to the cool, long-lasting LED bulbs used to generate the UVC light, and come with zero maintenance. At the same time they’re absolutely deadly to harmful micro-organisms and fit straight into existing suspended panel ceiling schemes. So what do the ceiling units cost? The X2 300 & 600– perfect for a care home’s communal areas - £ 395 & £895 per unit The X3 300 - perfect for a care home’s toilet cubicles - £495 per unit We have more models, including units to fit seamlessly into ducting to deal with things like Legionnaires diseases, and mobile units that your cleaning staff can wheel around quickly and easily for powerful hygiene on-the-go. Call us for a quote. You’ll be surprised what a good deal they are compared to hiring more cleaners, spending more time cleaning, and laying out cash month after month on chemical cleaning products.

As we learned for ourselves thanks to covid, humans aren’t usually very good at planning ahead for things that might or might not not happen. We had the knowledge, we knew the risks, we understood exactly how to prepare for a pandemic, and scientists were begging the government to act... but they didn’t. And then came covid. At one stage the Information Commissioner's Office had to order the government to release an unpublished report into Exercise Cygnus, the infamous 2016 exercise designed to test the UK's preparedness for a flu pandemic. These days the public has a heightened awareness of new infectious threats to human health. While the covid buzz has died right down we’re still seeing a steady stream of new variants turning up, some of which make it into the media and others that sink without a trace, deemed not bad enough to bother with. There are fresh threats in the wind too, the latest being ‘Disease X’. As experts in the UV light disinfection sector, we know how important it is to keep a finger on the pulse of the pandemic risk we constantly face in the UK. So here’s what we know about Disease X so far. About Disease X On January 15th 2024 world leaders will discuss preparations for the next pandemic. The talks take place at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, where global experts will explore the potential pandemic risk posed by Disease X. Apparently it’s an important agenda item. Why the fuss? The WHO has sent out new warnings that a so-far-unidentified disease could kill twenty times more of us than covid. Covid killed 10,000 people globally during December 2023 alone. New York’s suffering from a big covid wave right now. The grand global total death toll for covid is 6,991,829 (at 14th January 2024), which means a Disease X outbreak could kill as many as 1.4 billion of us.  “As infectious as measles with a fatality rate as high as Ebola” Scientists say Disease X is classified as an illness that’s “as infectious as measles with the fatality rate of Ebola”. The WHO says a pandemic of this type is ‘more of a probability rather than possibility’. Scientists at the government’s high security Porton Down lab in Wiltshire are working on vaccine preparedness right now. They and others want the government to begin making plans now. On the bright side, if there is one, so far the disease is literally unknown. The experts have created a ‘threat list’ of animal viruses that could infect humans and spread like wildfire, and they don’t know which of them is going to be the next pandemic. They just know that one of them, or something very like one of them, will ultimately become the Disease X everyone’s dreading. The idea is to force the government to prepare this time around so we’re ready when the worst case scenario happens. Then, when Disease X emerges, as much of the essential work as possible will have been done in advance. Worldwide, £1.15 billion has been pledged so far to help scientists prepare for whatever Disease X will eventually bring. Our government has promised £160 million and the Gates Foundation and Wellcome Trust have also contributed. At the same time the NHS is understandably concerned, keen to prepare well in advance so they’re ready next time. As Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, said, “You could use the phrase ‘it is when, not if’. We can’t put a handle on when, of course. The precise mechanism by which a virus comes out is always extremely unpredictable. You can never predict precise events, so you have to do it on sort of statistical grounds probability.” Do the wise thing - plan ahead! As Psychology Today reports, humans are notoriously bad at long-term planning. But that’s exactly what we’re going to have to do if we want to handle the next pandemic wisely and well. The kind of forward-thinking we need applies to everyone from members of the government and the NHS to businesses and individuals. And one exceptionally good way to plan ahead for health and hygiene is to fit safe, powerful UV light disinfection units at your premises. It kills viruses, bacteria, moulds, spores and more fast and well, and it’s an affordable common sense choice. If you’d like a no-obligation discussion about how UV light can disinfect your business and keep you going through thick and thin, get in touch.

Picture this. It’s a perfectly ordinary day and as usual, your surgery Waiting Room is packed with people. Toddlers with nasty coughs, old people whose immune systems aren’t as good as they used to be, a load of bad colds - some of which may be flu – plus a few injuries, a rash or two, and someone who may have an undiagnosed case of norovirus. It’s clear there’s a risk of things being spread, simply because your patients are sitting in one room, breathing, coughing, chatting, and expelling particles of potentially infected moisture into the air. In this article we take a look at UVC light hygiene for surgeries and related healthcare settings, and why it works so well to keep people and employees safe and healthy. We’ll also provide some price examples so you can see it’s an affordable choice. Why Waiting Rooms and treatment areas need UV light disinfection You don’t want your patients to pass diseases and illnesses on to each other, especially the very young, very old and vulnerable. Because it’s a healthcare setting, everyone in the Waiting Room is naturally a bit more vulnerable than usual. Nor do you want the practice nurses, administrators, reception staff and the doctors themselves to go off sick. It throws your scheduling out of whack and can mean patients suffer delays to diagnosis, referrals and treatment. Catching up with the delays caused by staff sick leave can take a while, adding unwelcome extra pressure to an already highly pressurised job. Add a pandemic, a particularly nasty strain of flu going around or a new covid variant and things quickly become a lot more difficult for practice staff as well as more risky for those in the Waiting Room. The risk of infections in surgeries According to the British Journal of General Practice, “The reception area of the GP surgery can be viewed as a collection of viral and bacterial incubators, many of which may be leaking. The typical patient’s discomfort at waiting 10 or 20 minutes for an appointment will increase exponentially if they have to sit between two people exhibiting all the classic symptoms of flu.” They say that one piece of research taking place in a hospital waiting room estimated the risk of acquiring flu during a half hour wait at about 3%, a number they say is “far from insignificant”, and the risk of catching measles stacks up to more than 13%. In their words, “This risk of acquiring infection is particularly significant for older patients and others with compromised immune systems. The risk of infection comes not only directly from infected patients, but also from chairs, leaflets, and other reading materials that may have been touched or expectorated upon.” The Journal also cites ‘shared toys and books that are then not wiped clean after use’ as an extra risk for children, “increasing the risk of direct infection to levels higher than in adults.” Helping you look after your patients and staff better At the end of the day every medical professional wants to do the very best for their patients, and at its most basic it involves providing a clean, safe place for people to wait. Human cleaners are brilliant, playing an essential role in keeping things safe and hygienic, but they can only do so much. The solution? It’s beautifully simple. When you shine UV light at a certain wavelength onto surfaces and into the air, it kills a remarkably long list of pathogens in an impressively small amount of time. It does the job by damaging the RNA and DNA inside viruses, bacteria, moulds, spores and more so badly that they can’t replicate – which means they’re effectively dead and can’t infect people. Our UVC disinfection units come in a variety of shapes and sizes to suit different situations. Some fit neatly and simply into an existing light fitting. They use very little electricity because the UV light is generated by LED bulbs, which are cool, safe and last for years. Some units stay on all the time, disinfecting the upper air safely and drawing the lower air through the unit to keep the area hygienic. Others switch on when a space is empty and off when someone enters the room, ideal for toilets, washrooms and treatment rooms. If you have a large surgery there’s a mobile unit that your cleaner can easily wheel from room to room, disinfecting areas very effectively within minutes, killing pathogens in the air and on every surface the light touches. If you have ducting for air conditioning or heating we’ve even created a ducting probe to fit inside, where it keeps the air passing through safe from nasty infections like legionnaires disease. The cost of fitting UVC disinfection in a typical surgery Let’s look at a typical setting, where you have four rooms for your GPs, two for the nurses, and an average-sized Waiting Room. UV light upper air disinfection unit One upper air disinfection unit for each room used by a doctor or nurse – total 6 units, total cost £3450 £575 per unit Very low ongoing costs thanks to energy-light LED bulbs UV light mobile disinfection unit To clean the Waiting Room, reception area, corridors and the rest of the premises, you invest in a 200W mobile disinfection unit. It costs nothing to talk Every surgery setting is different, of course, and yours will have its own unique disinfection needs based on the layout and size of the building and its rooms. We’re always pleased to talk and it costs nothing to find out more. Contact us for an exciting discussion about keeping your patients and staff safer and healthier.

Case Study

In the UK and parts of Europe we’re seeing a sharp hike in whooping cough, so dramatic it’s being called a ‘significant resurgence’. Nicknamed the 100-day cough, it’s a highly infectious respiratory infection and the ongoing surge is proving worry for health professionals thanks to the severe coughing fits it causes. Here’s everything you need to know about whooping cough and what you as a business owner can do to help prevent it spreading, including a look at the unusual power of UV light sanitising systems. How many whooping cough cases did we see in 2023? In England and Wales we saw a ‘substantial increase’ in cases in 2023 compared to the year before, with around 230% more people than usual falling ill with whooping cough. On 5th January 2024 the media reported a 120% surge in just a month. Apparently the celebrity Jeremy Clarkson has caught it and is struggling to manage the cough. The current hot-spots are London, the North West of England and the South East. About whooping cough in the UK Whooping cough, officially named Pertussis, can last for several weeks and occasionally bedevils the sufferer for as long as a year. A highly contagious bacterial disease, it can start off looking and feeling a lot like a common cold. But the coughing fits it brings can go on and on for a very long time, hence the 100 year cough nickname. The ‘whooping’ part comes from the unusual sound made when people try to draw breath in between coughs, and the sound can be a way to diagnose the illness in children. On the other hand the whooping sound isn’t as common in adults and very young infants, so the sound alone isn’t a reliable enough sign to make a firm diagnosis. Spread through the air in droplets, the bacterium is particularly dangerous for infants and young children. The complications can include pneumonia, hemoptysis (coughing up blood), otitis media (middle ear infections) and even seizures, sore ribs, a hernia, and urinary incontinence. What’s whooping cough like? The NHS says the first signs of whooping cough are similar to a cold, with symptoms like a runny nose and sore throat. After about a week, you can expect fits of coughing that last for a few minutes at a time and get worse at night. The ‘whoop’ happens when you need to gasp for breath in between coughs. Some people have difficulty breathing after a coughing bout and toddlers can even turn blue or grey through a lack of oxygen. The thick mucus the coughing brings up can make people vomit and all the constant coughing can turn the face bright red. The uncontrollable cough can last for many months but there’s usually no need for hospital treatment unless you’re suffering very badly or are less than 6 months old. As long as it’s diagnosed within three weeks, you’re usually prescribed antibiotics for whooping cough. They help the body fight the illness as well as suppressing how infectious it is. If you’ve been ill for more than three weeks you’re usually not infectious any more. When you should see a doctor about whooping cough Pregnant women should see a doctor if they come into contact with an infected person, and the same goes if a child less than 6 months old catches it. If the cough is very bad and getting worse, the recommendation is to see a GP. And if someone has a compromised or weakened immune system, it’s wise to seek medical help. Call 999 if someone’s lips, tongue, face or skin suddenly turn blue or grey, or has breathing difficulties. If the chest pain gets worse when breathing or coughing, it could be pneumonia so call 999. If a child is having fits or seizures, call 999. And be aware that the disease can look a lot like TB, another severe bacterial illness that’s fast increasing in the UK. It comes with some very nasty antibiotic resistant strains that can - and do - kill.  How long to isolate yourself and when to do it? If you’ve caught whooping cough, the experts recommend you self-isolate for at least 5 days while the antibiotics kick in, so you keep other people safe. How to stop whooping cough spreading to employees and customers Our UV light sanitising systems quickly, efficiently damage the DNA and RNA inside bacteria so badly they’re rendered harmless in minutes. While the whooping cough bacterium isn’t on the extensive list of tested bacteria proven to be killed by UV light there’s no reason to suspect it won’t be. It’s a bacterium like any other, and the same science applies. Whooping cough is just one illness on a growing list of infectious threats to humanity. UVC light is a low-cost to buy and run, a fiendishly good way to kill a huge list of threats including viruses, moulds and spores. It’s a match made in heaven. If you’d like to pioneer safe workplaces, safe spaces for consumers and a healthier business, let’s discuss the potential of UVC.

Case Study