Emergency Preparedness and Planning....2020 (SARS-CoV-2)

[fishwrangler]

Emergency Preparedness and Planning....or, How Our Operations Changed in Response to the Global Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19) Pandemic 

As we are all profoundly impacted by the events surrounding the emergence of the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) I am aiming to create a space where we can share our individual approaches to staffing, and changes in our day-to-day operations, and any other information relevant to maintaining an Aquatics Facility during this challenging and stressful time.

Many of you are acting from disaster plans which have been established in response to natural disasters (i.e. floods, ice storms, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc.) but I suspect that very few (though certainly some) had plans in place to contend with a human disease epidemic. What changes were required to make those plans work for this situation?

This is the place to outline what you are doing and how you are doing it. Uploading and sharing of SOPs, Written Disaster Plans, example staffing schedules and rotations, etc, will all be very helpful for us immediately, and into the future. Photos are great too!

This is also the place to articulate how things could have been done better, and how you and your group are working to improve on a difficult situation.

Some relevant questions to consider (please feel free to expand beyond these points):

• How has your staffing changed?
• Have you made changes to your animal feeding schedule?
• Have you made changes to the water quality parameters, or water quality management (i.e. water exchange rate, temperature set-point, etc)?
• Has your use of PPE changed?
• How are you ensuring human safety (disinfection stations, shower in/out, body temperature checks, etc.)?
• Have you made changes to the size of your animal colonies?

[Diana]

We have reduced down to minimum husbandry and minimum staffing. Staff are in teams of 2 or 3, with no overlap between teams. If a member of a team gets sick, that whole team stays home and other teams cover the additional days.
All surfaces are wiped down with disinfectant at the end of every day.
We have reduced feeding - so far adults from 2 to 1 feeds per day and fry/juveniles from 4 to 3 feeds per day, but will take this down to 2 as we need to.
All research is on hold, there are no researchers in the building. The city is under a 'shelter-in-place' order with only essential businesses open.
No changes have been made to water quality, or water parameters, and water quality checks are considered part of essential husbandry.
We have always worn scrubs and gloves and we have made no changes to this. Our scrubs are laundered and autoclaved on site and a member of housekeeping is coming in two days a week to continue this. Having less people also conserves gloves as some are no longer available, although I did buy lots of additional cases before the shortage began.
All staff have been issued a thermometer and have to check their temperature before coming to work. If they have a fever, cough, or respiraotyr distress they must not come to work, must report it to work and self-isolate for 2 weeks.
We have only designated doors for entry into the building and disinfection handwipes stations at each of these doors. Staff have been allocated to different doors to prevent overlap.
We have not euthanized ANY animals. We have all 'critical' tanks marked in case it comes to that.

[bruce]

As Australian and New Zealand members are already aware, we have been incredibly lucky in the way that the virus containment has gone in this sector of the world so far.

Complacency is something that unfortunately may become a side effect of that.

Our approach has been to separate our staff out into individuals. As we are a small facility, this enables an almost zero cross over between staff.
There is a mandatory exclusion for anyone who is exhibiting signs or symptoms that may be associated with covid 19 and that team member is to self isolate for a period of 14 days unless cleared by a medical professional to return to work prior.

Research has also been suspended at our facilities, and colony maintenance is the key goal.

For the moment zebrafish feeding is continuing as normal, and some minimal breeding is continuing for key line maintenance.
Some colony management has been done to manage workloads, but this has only been in the form of retiring out ageing stocks while retaining all critical and unique lines.

Pandemic response plans have been implemented and are continuing to be revised as time goes on.
If anyone wants a copy of these contact me directly.

Shared office and break spaces are being fogged with F10 veterinary disinfectant and door handles and other surfaces are disinfected with 70% etoh multiple times daily.

Initial team schedules were devised so that techs would work either 1 day on 1 day off, or 2 days on 2 days off. Reserve teams are available to relieve anyone who becomes ill or needs a break.

Some degree of "work from home" has been implemented where possible, with staff being assigned jobs such as updating S.O.P's or other policy documents as well as the normal day to day admin.

Until such a time as governmental policies change with either a relaxation or enhancement of restrictions is implemented we will continue on our current path.

Supplies of consumables have been sourced to enable us to ride out six months of operation in case of collapsing supply chain or other logistical issues.
We will be keeping ahead of the supplies to maintain this level of stock holding with rotation of perishable stocks as new materials arrive.

Other facilities managed by our group have ceased operations where there is the ability to do so. Again, staff in these facilities are being kept busy for the moment with admin and other works