NASA takes action to avoid COVID-19

To stop diseases — including COVID-19 — from spreading in space, NASA and its Russian counterpart, Roscosmos, keep astronauts in quarantine for weeks before a flight. They will also complete a detailed inspection and disinfection of cargo bags.

This quarantine process isn’t new, so astronauts are accustomed to such precautions. A string of space colds on early Apollo missions pushed NASA to start isolating its astronauts before launch more than half a century ago. (The Soviet Union also kept its Mir space station cosmonauts in quarantine ahead of launches.) Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins even lived in their Mobile Quarantine Facility — a converted Airstream trailer — for weeks after Apollo 11 returned from the Moon. However, this quarantine wasn’t as much about protecting the astronauts as it was about NASA’s desire to avoid bringing uninvited lunar microorganisms back to Earth.

Those early traditions carried over to the ISS, and they still help keep astronauts from getting sick in space today.

“The ISS Program has always had requirements in place to address preventing any disease-causing agent from being transferred to the ISS and thus potentially to the flight crew,” NASA ISS spokesperson Dan Huot tells Astronomy. “The processes in place have been very effective in this regard.”

And, this time, both the American and Russian space agencies are taking the quarantine even more seriously than usual. Astronauts are usually put into a two-week quarantine before their flight at the launch site in Kazakhstan; but, traditionally, they break it to place flowers at the grave of Yuri Gagarin, the first human to fly to space. That tradition — and all other off-site visits — have been called off, according to reporting by The Guardian. The space agencies have also extended the quarantine period, with NASA sequestering the astronauts for an additional two weeks before they even travel to Kazakhstan.

Beyond keeping astronauts in quarantine longer, NASA and Roscosmos are also taking other steps to reduce the number of potentially harmful microorganisms reaching the ISS next month. The technical support staff will wear protective gear and gloves as they handle cargo and help prepare the crew and capsule for launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in southern Kazakhstan. And the staff are even being kept in quarantine themselves, something typically not done. NASA says the preventive measures have been reviewed and approved by the space agency’s doctors, and they’re being “stringently followed” by the team in charge of implementing them.