WHAT CAN SPADINA TOWERS RESIDENTS DO? By now you have all received instructions from many sources. Please comply with strict adherance to all of these recommended protocols!

Spadina Towers residents have been reminded before on numerous occassions of their exposure to health and respiratiory issues due to a lack of humidification in our building. Humidity levels within residential units have dropped into extremely dangerous levels (less than10% vs. healthy levels of 50%) during the winter months in particular. This has directly contributed to an uneccessary increase in resident illness and their need for direct medical treatment and medications. There is no need for residents to be enslaved to a personal humidifier which requires constant attention when CENTRALIZED HUMIDIFICTION dramatically relieves residents of this need and at a lower cost.

Spadina Towers has in the past been recognized as an “upscale or luxury” condominium property because of its many features including “central humidification”. Many residents considered this feature when they purchased their condominium. Our commercial owners may not care if such residential features are maintained, but residents CERTAINLY SHOULD and THEY SHOULD STAND UP AND STAND FOR ALL FEATURES AND RIGHTS TO THE CONDO THEY HAVE PURCHASED.

When our central humidification was removed in 2010, Tom McClockin Sr. advised (on record) at the AGM that “the engineer advised him that that the humidifier was not necessary” and should be removed. When the engineer attending the meeting was asked to respond as to why humidification was removed, he advised, again on record that he was instructed to remove this service BECAUSE IT WAS TOO EXPENSIVE and that he was instructed to remove the existing humidification system in order to save money. In turn, the Corporation spent a million dollars on a new heating system but at the same time refused to pay $29,000 quoted by the engineer for upgrading central humidification. Where was the voice of our residential Board members? This most obivous illicit conduct on the part of the commercial owner this matter is blatently irresponsible and in total disregard for the respect, health and welfare of our residents. Such conduct has obviously disqualified the commercial owner from any immediate and future action required action necessary to address of this most serious matter. Why have RESIDENT BOARD MEMBERS REMAINED SILENT!

Unfortunately, since 2010, many of our residents have knowingly or unknowingly experienced respiratory issues relating to the lack of humidification in our building. Visiting air quality professionals have confirmed the same. Many concerns and requests of the Board to address this matter have most unfortunately received no response! If there was ever a time for responsible property management and a condominium Board of Directors to act responsibly on behalf of their residents, that time is now!

Residents must be proactive on this most critical issue and act immediately! They must demand immediate installation of central humidification, an essential component that exisited as an original service and mechanical component of the building that is clearly inscribed within the registered plan of the building as a legal component of every owners property.

Where do you go for help? Don’t expect any help from your residential board members are they are clearly under the direction of the commercial Board members. For those residents who still do not understand how their interests are represented in this building, should a resident Board member not support the postion of the commercial owner, they WILL SIMPLY NOT BE RE ELECTED

Unfortunately, it seems that even an international respiratory related pandemic has not attracted the attention of the Board and its need to address the problematic issues that impact the residents and tenants of Spadina Towers.

Residents Must Speak Up!

The Board is requested to seek immediately tenders (minimum of 3) without the participation of Mr. McClocklin, his associated management company, and other commercial Board members, for installation and replacement of an appropriate humidification system at Spadina Towers and present to unit owners at a General Meeting, the opening of these tenders.

Please review the following report recently issued by those who are qualified to understand the relevance and severity of this issue at Spadina Towers.

Humidity helps in the fight against COVID-19, virologists report. Washington, D.C., March 13, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — What can the public do to defend against the COVID-19 coronavirus?  One simple answer is to ramp up humidification at home and in the workplace, if humidity levels are low. Hospitals treating cases of viral respiratory infection may be advised to do the same.

Why has the novel coronavirus COVID-19 had only a minimal impact in tropical countries while temperate zone countries such as China, Korea, Italy, Iran and the United States have suffered outbreaks? Humidity, and especially indoor humidity, seems to hold the key.

In 2019, a research team at Yale University Medical School published a groundbreaking study (Kudo et al., National Academy of Sciences, 2019) which showed how low ambient humidity hurts the ability of the immune system to fight respiratory viral infection in animal hosts. As Yale immunologist Akiko Iwasaki repeatedly has tweeted, winter months require indoor heating, which leads to low indoor humidity, which in turn leads to reduced mucociliary clearance and innate antiviral immunity, resulting in more respiratory virus in the lungs and increased mortality.

Dr. Nancy Gough of Johns Hopkins University explained the Yale study thus (Medium, March 1, 2020): “When the temperature drops, the heat comes on. This reduces the amount of humidity in the air. It turns out this isn’t just uncomfortable; it also impairs the innate immune system in the respiratory tract.”

What do all the places with severe community COVID-19 outbreaks have in common? As a  group of U.S. and Iranian researchers (Sajadi et al. (2020)) concluded in a new study posted for review on March 9, 2020, “To date, Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by SARS-CoV-2, has established significant community spread in cities and regions only along a narrow east west distribution roughly along the 30-50 N” corridor at consistently similar weather patterns”. In each of the locations of significant community spread identified by the researchers, indoor humidity ranged from about 20% to 30% in the weeks prior to outbreak, which is fairly dry. “Because of geographical proximity and significant travel connections, epidemiological modeling of the epicenter predicted that regions in Southeast Asia, and specifically Bangkok would follow Wuhan, and China in the epidemic.” Instead, the researchers noted, “COVID-19 failed to spread significantly to countries immediately south of China.”

Dr. Gough further explained the importance of humidity, “The epithelial cells have small cellular protrusions called cilia that move the mucus to promote clearance of pathogens and particles that enter the respiratory system. Analysis of the mucus in the trachea showed that infection in low humidity resulted in the inability to of the cilia on the epithelial cells to move it. The low humidity made the mucus too thick.”

What can you do when low humidity is unavoidable? Explained Dr. Iwasaki, “A mask will certainly keep your nose and mouth warmer and more humidified. I always wear a mask on international flights for this reason, where 10% relative humidity and closed environment makes for a perfect transmission incubator.”

What should be the target humidity? The Yale team found that 50% ambient humidity at room temperature led to dramatically increased survival in their animal subjects. What if a humidifier is not available? A large pot of water carefully kept at a low boil can humidify dry winter air to healthy levels.

This new research suggests that warmer, more humid weather will soon bring relief to countries now affected by COVID-19. Until then, indoor humidification and the use of facemasks may save many lives and ultimately help the world turn the corner in the fight against this epidemic.

Key Citations:

1. Kudo et al. (2019) Low ambient humidity impairs barrier function and innate resistance against influenza infection. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2019
2. Gough, March 1, 2020. Fighting the Flu with Humidity: Researchers discover immune system benefits of humidity https://medium.com/@ngough_bioserendipity/fight Fighting the Flu with Humidity Researchers discover immune system benefits of humiditying-the-flu-with-humidity-28d4ccb42bd7
3. Sajadi et al. (2020) Temperature and Latitude Analysis to Predict Potential Spread and Seasonality for COVID-19https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3550308

Further reading:

1. Makinen et al. (2009) Cold temperature and low humidity are associated with increased occurrence of respiratory tract infections. Respiratory Medicine, Volume 103, Issue 3, March 2009, Pages 456-462
2. Salah et al. (1988) Nasal mucociliary transport in healthy subjects is slower when breathing dry air. Eur Respir J. 1988 Oct;1(9):852-5.
3. Shaman et al. (2009) Absolute humidity modulates influenza survival, transmission, and seasonality. PNAS March 3, 2009 106 (9) 3243-3248
4. Lowen et al. (2007) Influenza virus transmission is dependent on relative humidity and temperature. PLoS Pathog 3(10): 1470–1476.
5. Yang et al. (2011) Dynamics of airborne influenza A viruses indoors and dependence on humidity. PloS One 6(6): e21481.

Dan Hess
Dan Hess Research
Phone: (301) 704-6859
E-Mail: danhess00@yahoo.com