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Prevention of Contamination of Products by Covid-19 Final 2020 - 0423
Prevention of Contamination of Products by Covid-19 Final 2020 - 0423
Prevention of Contamination of Products by Covid-19 Final 2020 - 0423
Scope
Areas in scope are:
• Manufacturing areas
• Non-manufacturing areas
This document gives specific guidance for the manufacturing of Home Care, Beauty & Personal Care,
Food & Refreshment products. It supports the reduction (prevention) of the risk of cross contamination
from coronavirus in Manufacturing sites as well as in products.
Additionally, the document also explains the principles of prevention of Coronavirus contamination in
non-manufacturing areas.
This document is intended to highlight hygiene measures which manufacturing sites need to have in
place are described in much more detail in relevant Unilever GMP’s, Standards and Guidelines. The
mandatory requirements described in those documents are applicable as normal.
Not in scope
Occupational (SHE) requirements to prevent the risk of human to human transmission (e.g. social
distancing, temperature measurements of people at the entrance of factories). For more information,
see the Sharepoint link in below appendix from the global Incident Management Team (IMT)
Introduction
For simplicity reasons, throughout this document the word ‘coronavirus’ is mentioned. Below described
hygiene requirements however are also relevant for other micro-organisms, e.g. pathogenic bacteria,
spoilage causing bacteria, yeasts, moulds, all other viruses (e.g. Noro virus) as well as parasites (e.g.
Cryptosporidium).
The document is intended to be short and specific to give clarity on what and how to best maintain
hygiene focusing but not limited to Coronavirus. A lists of key hygiene precautions that must be in place
to prevent Coronavirus entering or spreading on site is given. The applicable GMP’s, Standards and
guidelines gives a full overview of hygiene requirements.
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The document is split into ‘Manufacturing Areas’ and ‘Other Areas’ (e.g. offices, reception areas,
canteens, restrooms). As mentioned, below key points have not the intention to be complete, it is
intended to list the key requirements during this Coronavirus pandemic. These requirements remain
applicable after the pandemic crisis, as these are key requirements that need to be always in place.
Appendix 1 gives links to expert reviewed documents as well as Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s).
Manufacturing Areas
From various Unilever internal documents and external international (scientific) documentation, it is
well known that – at this moment in time – there are no indications that potential product
contamination by Coronavirus can result in infection and illness of humans.
At the same time the risk of Coronavirus contamination to products need to be kept in control. This
comes primarily from health screening, hygiene, housekeeping and cleaning & disinfection. For this
reason, the following key requirements need to be in place:
Obsoletes
• Any obsolete materials and equipment must be removed from any manufacturing area to
facilitate general housekeeping and makes cleaning and disinfection easier and more effective.
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• It is not recommended to leave disinfectants on a surface without rinsing as this may brings a
toxicological risk above the Coronavirus risk of disinfected surfaces (although sometimes this is
mentioned by the disinfectant supplier)
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o Cleaning and disinfection include underside and backside as appropriate (i.e. the not
directly visible surfaces).
o Control rooms and any other areas being part of the manufacturing area (general,
standard, enhanced and high care).
o Outside of vessels, pumps, pipework, floors, and wall.
o Drains not containing visible debris, cleaned following normal frequency, disinfected
when indicated in GMP’s or when a factory risk assessment defined this.
• There is no need to increase cleaning and disinfection concentrations and times because viruses
are always in scope of these activities.
Office Areas
General
General social distancing and mouth masks usage is out of scope of this document. Follow Unilever
and/or country regulation; most strict applies.
Sensitivity: Confidential
o When heavy traffic cleaning and disinfection on hourly basis.
o When light traffic, every 4 hours cleaning and disinfection is enough.
• Special attention points for disinfection:
o Light switches, door handles, fixed phones, pens, handrails, reception desks.
• Reception desks may be (more) isolated by implementing glass/plastic screens.
• Distance marked signs on floors as appropriate. This includes lifts with signaling to maintain
social distancing (reduce the number of people allowed in the lifts).
Canteens
Eating Area
• To be cleaned and disinfected after each break, as normal (e.g. lunch break). This includes:
o Table-tops, chairs, service counters, handwash stations, press buttons of soap
dispensers, disinfectants.
• When the canteen is in continuous operation, isolate areas to be cleaned and disinfected while
keeping other areas in operation.
• Intermittently disinfection between 2 employees of the specific eating location.
• Utensils (plates, fork, spoon knife, chop sticks cups, trays)
o Collect as normal.
o Ensure regular hand washing and disinfection.
Kitchen
• Personal hygiene to be fully in place (for details see UQP23 and UQG2301). This includes but is
not limited to:
o Clean cloths and hair cover as normal.
o Regular hand washing using soap and warm running water and use of disinfectants after
hand washing (not replacing).
o Wearing mouth masks.
• Ingredients and product to be handled and used as normal.
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• All utensils, baskets, plates, bowls etc. to be cleaned and disinfected preferably using a machine
dish washer (see also below ‘Washing Area’) prior cooking activities.
• Cook food as normal, wash fruit and vegetables as normal. Clean hands as indicated above
between different activities as normal.
• Hourly clean and disinfect buttons, switches etc. when used by different persons. When
operated by one single person, frequency can be reduced.
END
20 April 2020
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Appendix 1 – Useful links
Because of the rapid changing of information, only links are listed below, not specific documents.
Link to approved cleaning and disinfection chemicals, concentrations and contact times by Diversey
and Ecolab
https://teams.microsoft.com/l/file/06AC8FA4-97AD-43BA-8BF5-04383D91A5CF?tenantId=f66fae02-
5d36-495b-bfe0-
78a6ff9f8e6e&fileType=xlsx&objectUrl=https%3A%2F%2Funilever.sharepoint.com%2Fsites%2FQualit
yExpertiseSupportCentre%2FShared%20Documents%2FGeneral%2FOverview%20Disinfectant%20Div
erseyEcolab-
V3.xlsx&baseUrl=https%3A%2F%2Funilever.sharepoint.com%2Fsites%2FQualityExpertiseSupportCent
re&serviceName=teams&threadId=19:4debbfb56dbb42238a0d9b9f86879e18@thread.tacv2&groupI
d=5e5bff5f-bf12-4515-83d6-048ed0d4f2f3
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