My split AC has been throwing water since yesterday. Since the outlet is pretty close to my bed, its been dripping some on the headboard and some drops fell on me.
I cleaned it as much as I could and hopefully someone will be in to fix it soon.
My worry is that the water drops might carry Covid? I have dried the headboard and sprayed disinfectant on it and the top of the bed sheets, but since some wafer fell on me (thats how I noticed in the first place) might be too late.
People can carry the virus that causes COVID. The viral particles can be carried in droplets exhaled by the infected person. Those droplets are potentially infectious. But there’s not really any way for viral particles to have infected your A/C unit. As k9bfriender points out, bacterial infections might be a potential risk with standing water, but what your A/C unit is spitting out at you is presumably just condensation. It’s unpleasant, and the damp could promote mold and mildew, which is a potentially hazardous to inhale, but there’s no risk for viral infection.
Not really.
Legionnaires disease generally requires warm water to thrive, like in commercial water-cooled A/C chillers. I’ve never heard of a case from a residential A/C, and there are a lot of those installed.
As @gdave said, your indoor unit is connected to the outside unit via refrigerant lines (cold in, warm out) that are sealed and electrical connections to power the control and fan. Condensation from the unit as it removes humidity from the air drains outside or to your plumbing. If it is backing up inside, the hose is blocked. You can unblock it typically by using a wire coat hanger or blowing compressed into it.
As stated, if there is COVID it came from someone in the room with the AC.
I think the issue is when the A/C turns off and the (wet) evaporator coil warms up. back in the day the coil used to be made of copper or brass, which has antimicrobial properties, but nowadays they’re all aluminum which is basically completely inert on the surface and can’t inhibit bacterial growth.
Good to know. Most of the time when I hear about an outbreak, it has to do with AC or a fountain of some sort.
I’m pretty sure there was a House episode where someone got it from a wall unit though, are you saying that I can’t trust fictional medical mystery shows for accurate epidemiological information?
But, yes, it does seems as though I was incorrect, it does not appear as though household AC is a vector for legionella.
The difference with “split units” is that in their case there is no air conduit as such into or out of the room – going through the wall to the machine closet in the case of central forced air, or to the outside in the case of a wall unit when the vent is open. So not likely to bring about CoVid or anything that was not brought into the room through the door or window.
What happens in a case such as the OP is that the condensation drain channels are getting restricted (from dust or corrosion), or that insulation on some “cold” lines has deteriorated or broken allowing pipe to be exposed to air and form condensation in places where it does not fall into the drain.
With a split unit this still can create accumulated water inside the unit, which is a risk for molds or bacteria depending on what is already in your environment, besides water accumulating or flowing over parts of the machinery where it is not supposed to, and maybe even leaking into the wall itself.
Absolutely no covid risk if nobody else with covid has been in your room to spread droplets to the device. Even if somebody with covid had been in the room, there are a few reasons why it may be difficult for the device to spread it.
There was the case of legionnaires disease from a water fountain in a hospital lobby. It was Wisconsin and I presume that it was not warm in the lobby like AC cooling towers.
Having said that, I agree with you that it is highly unlikely to get it in AC condensate water.
