benjamintreuhaft

I’m Benjamin, the CEO of Helpful.

One thing everyone should know: this team moved mountains to get this design and prototype this far. I say this to acknowledge their hard work and dedication.

Many people told them “no” (mostly because of the time and expense which is required to validate a new PPE implementation with FDA; in this case, there is no previously extant Design Master File to "piggyback" off) However, through sheer determination, they managed to deliver a validated proof of concept and got both industry and government to take a hard look and offer support to the development process.

…one thing I see repeatedly in comments is criticism or concern regarding Sandia National Labs' choice of surrogate when testing the UVisor chamber.

The surrogate used in testing is generally considered x10 harder to kill than CoVID. There are multiple studies regarding the use of HN2 as a surrogate for CoVID, and there is a lot out there regarding using UVC to deactivate viral objects - but the use case is important, and FDA is very clear that the specific lamp you choose is critical, and they refer you to the manufacturer for clear guidance on whether the component is suitable for your use case and implementation.

One of the reasons this project is so interesting is that the selected components and implementation resulted in a successful proof of concept test for the sterilization chamber. At scale, they were able to deliver enough energy to the test virus for the time required for this use case.

This implementation exceeded our expectations regarding viral deactivation.

With respect to the size of the viral object - as we are not filtering it with a substrate, the object size does not matter here - only that is rendered inactive. Based on the results of the Sandia test - the chamber design does that.

It’s worth noting that testing on PPE is not generally done with the actual CoVID pathogen. Nelson Labs uses an identical surrogate to Sandia, for example.

The large $5M n95 UVC sanitizers that went into hospitals to allow reuse of PPE were similarly tested with surrogate.

Regarding UVC exposure - no UVC hits the wearer’s skin. Wearer exposure to UVC would be unacceptable, and the team along with their design and simulation partners were very conscious of this. In this design, all UVC radiation is safely contained in the chamber and does not “leak” by virtue of the visor baffle so that they do not risk user exposure to the lamp radiation.

With respect to touching a contaminated surface and then touching your face - this would not be a good idea! If you touched a heavily contaminated surface (ie a pool of fresh snot containing a high viral load of CoVID) and then removed the visor and shoved said snot up your nose - that would not be what UVisor was designed to protect against!

There are numerous UVC surface decontamination tools available on the market, and these are currently in wide usage in hospitals and nursing homes. Technically, if you exposed the aforementioned infectious snot with one of these devices (read the device instructions regarding decontamination time!) you could remove the visor and shove the decontaminated snot up your nose, without fear of CoVID infection. However, note you may then be subjecting yourself to another more sturdy pathogen the decontamination wand does not have the power to deactivate.

The above is said with humor: please absolutely do not shove another person’s snot up your nose!

I’m Benjamin, the CEO of Helpful Engineering.

The point you make was considered and explored, but after consultation with a large number of experts across medicine, determined to be not worth the additional complexity and weight incurred.

For those wearing either a uVisor or an appropriate piece of PPE - the exhaust is not an issue.

For those not wearing a mask - you should be, especially in an enclosed space, even more so if you are concerned about exposure to asymptomatic infection.

I originally pushed for an exhaust vent that resterilizes exhaust. After looking at the simulation, and after considering that positive pressure (not including isolation wards in hospitals frequently do not sterilize exhaust (some do, some do not), I changed my mind.

What is important is that the wearer is protected. It is up to others to protect themselves in a similar fashion.

Your question is the right kind of challenge! In a more complex implementation, you could add the feature. It would however be a different market/use case/price point.

...This is a complex question, but I'll drill down on the thing I know best. Advertising.

The advertising product, along with the tools behind it, is just about the worst. Even the concept of "truth in advertising" strikes me as a falsehood as all advertising is aspirational. It's not really "informative" so much as "manipulative."

I probably would not have nearly as much of a problem with any of the big platforms if they would just throw all paid advertising out the door and charge me $5/month to talk to my friends and post pictures of my dog.

Good Question.
There is nothing keeping organizations with traditional manufacturing processes from utilizing these designs.

Makermask - by which I think we mean the SurgeMask design- should be a dead simple problem.

It is a design. It has a material specification. All it requires is to be cut and sewn from the correct material, apply a label so that people know what it is, and you are done.

It can be manufactured by the many thousands by local sewing workshops and industries, like, yesterday.

Entire garment districts can do this.

Costume departments can do this.

Domestic manufacturers of sewn items can do this.

None of this is hard. You just have to use the right materials,follow the instructions, and that’s it.

What keeps industry from doing it? They are 100% free to do it. The design is open source and copyleft. There are no restrictions. Go make it. Put your sticker on it. Do a good job.

If you want Helpful to make sure you have done a good job, so that people trust your output, you can get in touch with us and we will certify your product as having been done right.

Hit our Slack and speak with #project-reach4help!

It’s a great idea!

I think about randomized polling all the time. It’s a powerful tool that - used for the right reasons (not to make you feel like you need new [athlete=value] shoes) - might give us a much better “sample” of Wut. Is. Up. and what we need to really pay attention to.

Asking important questions like you just asked: 👍🏼