「消毒も楽々」電話ボックス風コロナ検査場、韓国が導入

【ソウルＡＦＰ＝時事】韓国ソウルの病院はこのたび、電話ボックス風の新型コロナウイルス検査場を導入した。医療スタッフはプラスチックパネルを挟んで安全に患者の検査を行うことができるという。（写真は電話ボックス風の新型コロナウイルス検査場で、看護師と話す男性）
　Ｈ＋ヤンジ病院前に設置されたテントの下に並んだ四つのボックスは、有害な粒子が外に漏れないよう減圧されている。
　患者は１人ずつボックスに入り、インターホンで医療専門家による手短な問診を受ける。必要があれば、医療スタッフがパネルに据え付けられたゴム手袋に手を入れて、患者の鼻や喉から検体を採取する。
　この検査にかかる時間は７分ほど。ボックスは検査後に消毒・換気される。
　Ｈ＋ヤンジ病院のキム・サンイル院長はＡＦＰに対し、ボックスは、従来の減圧室よりも小型で消毒が「著しく簡単」で、「はるかに安全な検査場」だと説明した。
　韓国はかつて、新型ウイルスが発生した中国に次ぐ感染者を出していたが、大規模な検査と感染者の追跡調査のおかげで、流行を抑えることができたとみられている。
　医師の紹介がある場合または結果が陽性だった場合、検査は無料となっており、１６日午前０時までに約３０万人が検査を受けた。
　韓国は流行の初期段階で、防護服を着た医療スタッフが車の窓から手を入れて患者の鼻から検体を採取するドライブスルー形式の検査場を導入。今では世界各国で採用されている。
　電話ボックス形式はドライブスルー形式と違い、車を運転しない人や子どもも同じように利用することができる。また、感染の疑いがある患者を病院外にとどめることで、院内を消毒する手間も省ける。
　電話ボックス形式の検査場は、ラボなどで使用される安全キャビネットを基につくられた。安全キャビネットは、グローブボックスとしても知られている。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/03/18-12:43）

A South Korean hospital has introduced phone booth-style coronavirus testing facilities that allow medical staff to examine patients from behind the safety of a plastic panel, the latest innovation in the country's drive to track down infections.
The row of four booths -- which use negative air pressure to prevent harmful particles from escaping outside -- stand under a tented shelter outside the H Plus Yangji Hospital in Seoul.
The hospital dubs them the Safe Assessment and Fast Evaluation Technical booths of Yangji hospital -- or SAFETY for short.
Each patient steps into the box for a rapid consultation by intercom with a medical professional who, if necessary, takes their samples by swabbing their nose and throat using arm-length rubber gloves built into the panel.
The whole process takes about seven minutes and the booth is then disinfected and ventilated.
The smaller SAFETY boxes are significantly easier to disinfect than the usual negative-pressure rooms and so are a much safer space to be tested in, hospital president Kim Sang-il told AFP.
Also each booth only accepts one patient at a time, unlike negative pressure rooms where patients often need to share space as they get tested, he said, adding the hospital's negative pressure units are now reserved for treatment purposes.
The South was once the hardest-hit country outside China, where the virus first emerged, but appears to have brought its outbreak under control thanks to a huge testing and contact-tracing effort.
By midnight on Monday almost 300,000 people had been tested -- processes that are free to anyone who has been told to have a test by a doctor, or who tests positive.
Early in the epidemic it introduced drive-through testing for the virus, with medical staff in protective suits swabbing noses through car windows, a practice now adopted internationally.
The SAFETY booths offer similar accessibility for those who do not drive -- and children -- and by keeping suspected patients outside, avoid the need to disinfect parts of the hospital building.
The facility was created based on biosafety cabinets -- also known as isolation glove boxes -- where laboratory workers perform operations through arm-length rubber sleeves.
The South has been recording fewer than 100 new cases a day this week -- a far cry from the 500-600 earlier this month -- but authorities have warned of new small cluster infections emerging in the metropolitan area where half of the South's 51 million population is concentrated.
The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said 84 new cases had been confirmed on Monday, taking the total to 8,320.
Six more people had died, taking the death toll to 81, it added.
Scores of events -- from K-pop concerts to sports matches -- have been cancelled or postponed over the contagion, and President Moon Jae-in announced Tuesday the formation of an emergency economic council.