Home air purifiers have been slowly gaining mainstream popularity over the past decade but weirdly enough there aren’t many products that can clean the air you breathe inside a car. That’s not good considering research has shown that commuters who sit in traffic for an hour every day are exposed to air pollution that's equivalent to passively smoking 180 cigarettes a year. Worse still, tests by King’s College London in 2013 found that an ambulance driver was exposed to much higher levels of particulate matter than a cycle courier during the working day, and it all has to do with how air gets trapped inside modern vehicles. At this point some of you are probably thinking you're protected enough by your cars’ air-conditioning systems’ recirculation functions, but you're not. As a mater of fact there isn't a car today that has filters capable of removing nitrogen dioxide gas from the air, not even Teslas with their large HEPA filters and “Bioweapon Defense” mode.
Luckily, there is a new British-Danish-developed device called the Aibubbl that does have such a filter though, and it's a steal at just 300 USD. This gizmo won’t just clean your car’s cabin of harmful particles and gases, it will also trap and kill nearly all airborne bacteria and viruses, and that includes the coronavirus Covid-19.
Resembling a Bluetooth speaker that attaches to the passenger seat headrest using a metal, crash-tested strap and buckle, the key to Airbubbl’s design is its formidable filter works in combination with advanced airflow dynamics. In other words, when attached to the back of the passenger headrest, vents at each end of the device send out filtered air in a pattern that is designed to effectively help it reach your nose and mouth. Keeping the car’s fan on the lowest setting and directing that in-coming air into the footwell greatly improves Airbubbl's effectiveness, according to Airlabs, its manufacturer.
It also turns out that last April, Airbubbl was given a resounding endorsement when the English healthcare transport provider HATS Group, announced they had installed one in every single one of their London-based ambulances.
Matthew Johnson, professor of chemistry at University of Copenhagen and chief science officer at AirLabs, said: “Our focus here is on reducing exposure for workers who cannot avoid close contact with coronavirus patients, and for anyone working in essential jobs in enclosed spaces. The science shows that by installing an air filtration device, like Airbubbl, you remove more than 95 per cent of airborne particles. By decreasing the concentration of airborne particles that could contain the virus being breathed in by workers in critical environments, we reduce the risk of them being infected.”
Honestly, we all need one of these gizmos, and ASAP.
