Homeowners may be surprised to learn that whole-house humidification is a vital part of an effective flu-season support system. Along with getting a flu shot and employing effective hand-washing practices, employing whole-house humidification ensures healthy indoor relative humidity levels, and helps ward off the flu and other airborne viruses.
Dry air contributes to conditions that give viruses more of a fighting chance when it comes to infecting humans. Here’s how the process is enhanced when conditions inside the home are dry, as they typically are during the winter heating season:
- As air temperatures become cooler, the air holds less and less moisture, resulting in drier air outside — and inside the home.
- Dry air causes health conditions such as dry nasal passages and irritates respiratory conditions. When the nasal passages crack, viruses can more easily penetrate.
- Coughs and sneezes often contain viruses, along with moisture. Dry air pulls moisture from a cough or sneeze, but the virus hangs around in the air, where it can be inhaled by humans.
By restoring moisture to the air via whole-house humidification, you can alleviate the primary conditions that increase the likelihood of contracting the flu virus. Aside from the obvious benefit of serving your whole home, whole-house systems offer a big advantage over portable devices. Namely, their controls allow for automatic adjustments in output. Once you set a healthy relative humidity range, the system will adjust how much water vapor it generates according to the indoor environment.
Whole-house humidification connects to the furnace or heat pump system, so that humidified air is delivered into the home via the ductwork. This process ensures that every area of your home that contains a supply-air register will benefit from whole-house humidification. You can go anywhere in your home and enjoy respite from dry-air conditions.
Whole-house humidification systems also offer additional benefits beyond health. They restore necessary moisture to the air, preventing wood products in your home from becoming damaged and warped. Further, moist air feels warmer to humans, so users of whole-house humidifiers add energy savings to their list of benefits. When the air feels warmer, you’ll turn the thermostat setting down.
For more information about whole-house humidification, please contact us at Climate Control Company. We’ve served Western Colorado homeowners since 1956.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in Aspen, Vail and the surrounding Western slope communities in Colorado about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about whole-house humidification and other HVAC topics, please visit our website.
Image courtesy of Shutterstock
