1st September 2019 By The Pool People No comments yet legionella, legionellosis, legionnaires

Legionnaires’ Disease in Spa’s, Pools & Hot Tubs

It is imperative to stress the dangers or potential dangers of Legionella or legionnaires disease transmission through poorly maintained pools and hot tubs.

We always associate legionnaires with Hot tubs due to the small mists/droplets of water that form when the hot tub is in action. Moreover, the bubbles are blowing. We also associate Hot Tubs with hot water. However, when warm or hot water is in play, we also have to take into account pools that have warmer water facilities where lots of activity is taking place.

What do we class as warm or hot water?

We class water that exceeds 29 degrees as warm. Hot water and pool or spa or hot tubs necessitate proper treatment. What do we class as lots of activity? When people (mostly children) are playing games while swimming and agitating the water, they create a comparable scenario to that of a hot tub. In this case, a standard swimming pool, hotel pool or water park that has lots of activity is in danger of contracting legionnaires disease without proper water treatment.

Legionella or legionnaires disease in Pools and Hot Tubs

Knowing this, and combined with the hot temperatures that Cyprus encounter in July and August and the water temperature is commonly around 31 degrees.

Adding the extra activities of the users creates a giant hot tub. Moreover, if the pool is not maintained with the same attention to detail as one would manage a hot tub, it can lead to identical issues.