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Comment by jmacd | Hacker News Reader

We recently built a new house and I decided to over provision air handlers so that we could get better control at the room level. As a result of that, there are a lot of fans moving a lot of (sound dampened!) air, through air filters. I upgraded the air filtration on each of them to something pretty close to HEPA, but not quite. I also have activated carbon added to the filters in order to reduce an odours.

Long story-- the house is comfortable, yes, but we also just don't get nearly as much transmission of viruses between the family. Of course plenty of colds get passed around with 2 adults and 3 kids, but anecdotally we just seem to be way less sick and rarely all sick at once.

My alertness level is also never an issue like I remember it being, but I have made many other lifestyle changes which could be having an impact on that.

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We added a UV light to our AC system in our < 2 year old house and went from everyone sick every couple months to rarely sick. 2 adults and > 1 children Anecdata, of course.

Wow, I had no idea about this!

Beware your air filter may get dirtier faster (our AC company says, anyway) because of dead organisms.

To join your anecdata, covid has had a huge impact on my wellness. Since the pandemic began I have been sick once, and that was miserable (I caught covid 2 months ago).

I credit a general acceptance that if you’re sick you stay at home, and mask wearing.

I want to get something like this to get some relief from hayfever. I find my symptoms are much better when I'm at work (air conditioned office) than at home.

You can add portable air filters, either units made specifically for it, or homemade Corsi-Rosenthal boxes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corsi%E2%80%93Rosenthal_Box

> but I have made many other lifestyle changes which could be having an impact on that.

Could you share?

Mostly I switched from high intensity cardio workouts (1hr+ cycling or running fast/hard) to much longer low impact workouts (walking for 3 hours+ some evenings).

The most likely reason that had a big impact was that I am not sitting on the couch and thus not snacking late at night...

Do you run the fans constantly or periodically even without the A/C engaged?

It does 5 full (filtered) air exchanges with outside air per hour.

There are a further ~10 full circulations of internal air through the full filtering system.

That level of air movement remains comfortable because we have a lot of ducting (we detailed in a lot of grilles, not just one single one per room) so it is a low-velocity high throughput system. You never get a lot of air blowing out of one place, but you get a lot of placed blowing a little air.

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