April 23, 2020 / Jeff Lagasse, Associate Editor
Healthcare workers are rightly being lauded as heroes as they hunker down on the front lines of treating patients infected with the COVID-19 novel coronavirus. With their efforts come the risk of contracting the virus themselves, but researchers are working on a system that could help protect them from airborne infection.
Professor Yochai Adir, from the Lady Davis Carmel Medical Center Pulmonary Division, Israel, led the research team. They have designed a cost-effective, constant flow plastic canopy system that can help to protect healthcare workers who are at risk of airborne coronavirus infection while delivering non-invasive ventilation or oxygen via high flow nasal cannula (HFNC), according to a research letter published in European Respiratory Journal. 
Ventilatory support with non-invasive ventilation or HFNC are often used to treat people with respiratory failure, a symptom of severe coronavirus disease, as they help patients with respiratory difficulties to breathe by pushing pressured air into the lungs via a mask covering the mouth and/or nose.