Mark Hendriksen

Not sure how good your Dutch is… but further to my comment on the excellent and insightful article in The Guardian by Maria Centracchio MIWFM, ‘Sensor taps and no door handles: Covid-19 shows it’s time to rethink public toilets‘ I’d replied, “Great article! Also, at the same time to implement designs and creative ideas to lessen the queues for ladies and also improve mens urinals (with waterless and odourless, for example look at Urimat systems.) It would be good to do a survey on the whole public loo layouts etc., but certainly agree about sensor taps & no door handles as part of that. Interestingly as I believe The Guardian has reported before, scientists are researching how sampling our stools could offer a faster and cheaper way to pinpoint where outbreaks of COVID-19 are brewing before scores of people become seriously ill, either by tracking or detecting remnants of the virus in municipal sewage.” In essence aside from the tracking, the whole bathroom/restroom design needs a rethink. Not only regarding the gender issues queues etc. but to make pretty much everything ‘touch free’ ensure toilet seats are on every toilet and avoid any splashbacks and water accumulating on floors or surfaces. It’s all possible, but not enough is happening nor fast enough.

Subsequently, having no sooner posted my reply than my (Dutch) wife popped into my office to show me this great video from nu.nl in The Netherlands, where tests can be done without testing people. It basically translates as… “Why they are looking at your stool for traces of coronavirus. The coronavirus has been found in our sewers. But why are we specifically diving into our sewage to find it?‘ Check out the video here.