As remote working and virtual meetings continue to play a crucial role in businesses during the pandemic, global communications firm Zoom has announced a suite of upgrades to its products with a renewed focus on workplace health and safety.
The updates include a virtual check-in which offers a virtual receptionist to take participants through safety protocols before they begin a meeting. The most significant upgrade is what Zoom are calling a Neat Bar, which contains new technology called Neat Sense.
The Neat Sense technology allows offices or workspaces to monitor air quality, humidity, CO?, and volatile organic compounds to ensure worker health and safety.
Zoom has explained that “users will be able to manage and monitor the room’s environment and air quality.”
According to a recent study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, “air pollution is also one of the greatest challenges of our millennium, and some early studies have highlighted a positive correlation between air pollution and the spread of the virus.”
“Atmospheric PM (particulate matter) would function as a carrier, or as a transport vector, for many viruses. Thus, PM may have increased the effectiveness of the virus spread in the aerosol as it creates a microenvironment suitable for its persistence.”
Experts’ have explained that the recent Covid-19 outbreak at Brisbane’s Grand Chancellor Hotel was ‘most likely’ from airborne transmission.
The new technology introduced by Zoom is the latest in a range of air quality monitoring products and shows that major players in the tech space are committing to investing in creating systems to better monitor workplace air quality for employee health and safety.