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Abstract

There is great disparity in the way we think about and address different sources of environmental infection. Governments have for decades promulgated a large amount of legislation and invested heavily in food safety, sanitation, and drinking water for public health purposes. By contrast, airborne pathogens and respiratory infections, whether seasonal influenza or COVID-19, are addressed fairly weakly, if at all, in terms of regulations, standards, and building design and operation, pertaining to the air we breathe. We suggest that the rapid growth in our understanding of the mechanisms behind respiratory infection transmission should drive a paradigm shift in how we view and address the transmission of respiratory infections to protect against unnecessary suffering and economic losses. It starts with a recognition that preventing respiratory infection, like reducing waterborne or foodborne disease, is a tractable problem.
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Science
Volume 372 | Issue 6543
14 May 2021

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Published in print: 14 May 2021

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Lidia Morawska
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.
Joseph Allen
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.
William Bahnfleth
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Philomena M. Bluyssen
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Atze Boerstra
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Giorgio Buonanno
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Junji Cao
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Stephanie J. Dancer
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Andres Floto
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Francesco Franchimon
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Trisha Greenhalgh
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Charles Haworth
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Jaap Hogeling
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Christina Isaxon
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Jose L. Jimenez
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Jarek Kurnitski
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Yuguo Li
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Marcel Loomans
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Guy Marks
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Linsey C. Marr
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Livio Mazzarella
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Arsen Krikor Melikov
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Shelly Miller
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Donald K. Milton
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William Nazaroff
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Peter V. Nielsen
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Catherine Noakes
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Jordan Peccia
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Kim Prather
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Xavier Querol
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Chandra Sekhar
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Olli Seppänen
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Shin-ichi Tanabe
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Julian W. Tang
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Raymond Tellier
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.
Kwok Wai Tham
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Pawel Wargocki
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.
Aneta Wierzbicka
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.
Maosheng Yao
Affiliations are listed in the supplementary materials.

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