As cruise lines work to resume cruises in a safe manner, a company has invented the world’s first method of applying antimicrobial lacquer to passenger cards on cruise ships.
The process involves applying antimicrobial lacquer to passenger ID cards issued at embarkation, on both sides of a card, using a small desktop coating machine at point of embarkation.
With this new method however, coating pre-printed personalized cards with antimicrobial lacquer, is so simple that the check-in operator simply feeds a printed cruise card into the desktop machine, which sits on the desk next to the card-printer. Antimicrobial lacquer is automatically applied to both sides of the card, instantly UV-dried and is ready in under 8 seconds.
Stephen Black, Director of Antimicrobial Cards Ltd, came up with the idea after struggling for years to find an alternative method.
“Once a card has been personalized by overprinting with details and possibly a photo ID, then any antimicrobial treatment that might have been previously applied onto the card, will have been covered up,” he said.
“Speed and size were major considerations in the design of the machine,” continued Stephen, a keen cruise-enthusiast himself, and well aware of the need for speedy yet efficient embarkation.
Antimicrobial cards can aid in the defense against the spread of disease-causing germs and have a 99.99% efficacy against E. Coli, MRSA and more according to the company. Several of the substances within the silver-ion based additive have been successfully tested against viruses like COVID-19, such as Influenza, and SARS.
As there is growing public awareness of the need for extra protection against potentially dangerous germs, Antimicrobial Cards Ltd are promoting, in addition to Passenger/Crew ID cards, Hotel Key Cards and all other variants of plastic cards and have licensed their patented technology in the U.S.A. and beyond.
