Time-managed PAPR use enables a balanced approach to infection control and personal freedom

Abstract

Full lockdowns during airborne-disease pandemics impose substantial socio-economic costs. To address this, to the best of the author’s knowledge, three prior contributions were made for the first time: (i) proposed a concept in which medical-grade Powered Air-Purifying Respirators (PAPRs) used by the general public can serve as an engineering alternative to lockdowns; (ii) disclosed a proof-of-concept PAPR with aerosol-blocking performance comparable to medical devices at a parts cost of USD 40; and (iii) demonstrated via mathematical modeling that if more than 55% of the population wears PAPRs continuously—or if everyone wears them intermittently to a moderate extent—the effective reproduction number Rt can be reduced from 2.0 to 0.9. Building on these prior results, this study proposes and prototypes an IoT-based management framework—the PAPR Wearing-Status Networked Management System (PWS-NET)—that seeks to reconcile governmental infection control with individuals’ freedom to choose the time and place of non-wearing. The core metric is Saved Allowance Time (SAT), i.e., an accumulative daily allowance for mask-off periods. The prototype integrates three components: (a) real-time wearing detection for PAPRs using a differential-pressure sensor, (b) user-declared location via a smartphone application, and (c) a rule-based web server that updates SAT on a daily basis. Scenario tests that emulate realistic use conditions confirmed correct operation of SAT updates and violation judgments, as well as effective real-time visual feedback to users. Constructed entirely from off-the-shelf components, the prototype is intended as a starting point for large-scale field studies aimed at integrating SAT-based governance into public-health policy for future outbreaks.