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Comment by DoreenMichele | Hacker News Reader

All staff members preparing to depart to the station had to undergo a PCR test in Belgium two hours before leaving for South Africa, take a PCR test five days after their arrival in Cape Town, where they also had to quarantine for ten days. Another test was required when leaving Cape Town for Antarctica and another PCR test had to be undergone five days after arrival.

To me, that sounds like lots of testing, not strict health measures. There is a difference.

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the strict health measures are the quarantines and consequences of testing. what happens if someone tests positive?

Seriously not impressed.

Just spitballing here but to me strict health measures would be something like:

1. Here is the antiviral prophylactic we expect you to take starting X days before you depart and continuing until X days after you arrive.

2. Here is the shower at the entrance to the base that you must use before entering the base proper.

3. Here are the OTC meds or other protocols we expect to keep coughs and such under control in common areas if you are having any issues.

4. Here are your instructions for how to do lung clearance in the shower to minimize coughing and such in common areas.

I'm sure I could come up with more if I really needed to. This is just off the cuff for the sake of conversation with an internet stranger, so not much effort or thought has gone into it.

You've got to be kidding. Effective antiviral drugs aren't at all benign; it would be completely unethical to administer them on a prophylactic basis to healthy patients who don't even have a confirmed exposure. There is no reliable evidence that showers are effective for controlling respiratory viruses. OTC cough suppressants are nearly useless, barely better than placebos.

https://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/otc-meds

Seriously those are almost all bad or pointless suggestions reflecting a lack of relevant medical knowledge.

You can clean the nasal passage with hydrogen peroxide but it’s not a nice thing to do.

I have a form of cystic fibrosis. Nasal washes are routinely prescribed for the condition and my CF specialist gave me a recipe for a strong saline wash containing alcohol.

I have, in fact, used peroxide to wash my sinuses. The result was that, in addition to being tortured, my sinuses were stripped of mucus and I was now defenseless and more vulnerable to infection. It took a while for my sinuses to heal.

Medically recommended sinus washes are generally based on some kind of salt solution. I've tried at least three different variations over the years. Gentler is better because it is less of an assault on the body.

A xylitol-saline solution was the gentlest and most effective. Xylitol is a simple sugar known to kill infection. That worked far better for me than standard saline, strong saline or saline with alcohol added and it wasn't torture like the others.

I would strongly recommend against using peroxide on your nasal passages.

This is not medical advice. I am not a doctor. I'm just a factory reject with defective genes who has put lots of stuff up my nose over the years, sometimes out of desperation. So I have, in fact, put peroxide up my nose and my personal opinion is that it's a really bad thing to do as it hurts like a bitch and also leaves you defenseless.

At least they were all double vaccinated.

Oh wait, that does not help against catching and transmitting the virus.

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