Polymers and Polymeric Materials in COVID-19 Pandemic: A Review

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been at its worst and the world is fighting to help global public health. In this aspect the role played by polymers and polymeric materials including plastics as the main material in medical devices, personal protective equipment for health care workers is huge. Advantages like mass production, lower cost and possibilities for sterilization and disinfection of the plastic materials make them an inevitable material in healthcare sector. Apart from plastics, anti-viral and anti-microbial coatings, polymeric nanocomposites and functional polymers have been introduced as a helping tool against COVID-19. This review focuses on the application of polymers, and polymeric materials in COVID-19 pandemic. Usage of plastics and its applications in healthcare and related sectors have been reviewed. The major challenges faced and future prospects on the usage of polymers have also been discussed.


Introduction
The coronavirus disease 2019  pandemic is an unprecedented global crisis that, by many calculations will have a deep and devastating economic and social impact on the scale of the Great Depression.
This crisis gave plastics a major image makeover amongst consumers; there is now a widely held outlook that plastic products are safer and cleaner than the recycled and reusable solutions being touted earlier and are at the forefront of the fight to contain the spread of contagion. Gone are the days when plastics will be spoken of only in terms of environmental leakage and a ban. Plastics will also How to cite this paper: Gadhave, R.V., Vineeth, S.K. and Gadekar, P.T. (2020) Polymers and Polymeric Materials in COVID- 19 Open Journal of Polymer Chemistry benefit from increased spending on household cleaning, hygiene, and personal protection products, as well as higher domestic food consumption from a more home-based life. However, because this crisis will also cause deep destruction of personal wealth and economic uncertainty, consumers will also reduce discretionary spending on leisure, entertainment, travel and tourism, and eating out, which will impact related plastics consumption. Apart from these areas of the economy, major sectors including automotive and white goods will also face tremendous headwinds.
Protective garments used by health workers such as mask, caps, goggles and gowns are generally made from plastics and are used by health professionals in such outbreaks to reduce the risk of infection as it works as a barrier from bacteria and virus. The disposable plastic syringes have completely replaced alternative options. So far there are no alternative material has proven at par with the ease of utility and economics of all these varieties of medical grade plastics.
Plastics are valued in healthcare because of their versatility, sterile nature, and safety for patients and providers, cost effectiveness, ease of use, and utility in new applications and solutions. There is an almost endless list of medical applications for plastics as shown in Figure 1. Plastics will continue to offer exceptional solutions in the future [1]. With increasing use of plastics in healthcare industry, the government and regulators should enforce right disposal and recycling practices to avoid contamination and spread of COVID-19 infection.

Plastics Used in Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
The capital of Hubei province in China, Wuhan, became the center of an outbreak  In the last few days, plasma transfusion from COVID recovered patients has been found to help in the treatment of infected patients. This blood plasma is collected from recovered patients using the process of plasmapheresis. Such membranes used for plasmapheresis are made up of polyethersulfone (PES), polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) or even PP [6]. Also, Tyvek™, a product made by Dupont consisting of flash spun high density polyethylene (HDPE) is widely used for making full body suits that cover head to toe for workers who are exposed to highly contaminated environments.
According to a study conducted by ASSOCHAM (Associated Chamber of

Antimicrobial Polymers and Coatings
The purpose of this invocation will likely be used to drive private businesses to reported that the COVID-19 outbreak would likely impact the medical product supply chain, including potential disruptions to supply or shortages of critical medical products in the U.S. [11] Additive manufacturing (i.e., 3D Printing) is uniquely well positioned to support the shortage of critical medical devices [11].
Advancements in additive manufacturing techniques and development of antimicrobial polymers, offer the possibility of printing and customizing a wide range of medical devices.
The critical limitation for the use of polymeric materials to additively manufacture critical medical devices is the material contamination by bacteria and viruses [12]. Previous investigations have shown strong evidence of the use of different forms of copper as a biocidal agent [13]- [19] and the use of copper nano-

Anti-Viral Coating
Literature survey shows that the nanoparticles of various metals and metal oxides like Zinc Oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles [26], Cuprous Oxide (CuO) nanoparticles [27], Silver (Ag) nanoparticles [28] [29], Nano-sized Copper (I) Iodide particles (CuI), Gold nanoparticles on Silica (Au-SiO 2 ) nanoparticles and also some Quaternary ammonium cations are very promising to inactivate the virus and are well proven. The plausible ways of functioning of the doped nano active materials against COVID-19 viruses would be as follow: • As Ag nanoparticles have been reported to inhibit the replication of virus nucleotides, the main mechanism of its being virulent. It binds to electron donor groups such as Sulfur, Oxygen, and Nitrogen commonly found in enzymes within the microbe. This causes the enzymes to be denatured thus effectively incapacitating the energy source of the cell and the microbe will quickly die; • The cationic silver (Ag + ) might work to inactivate the SARS-CoV-2 by interacting with its surface (spike) protein S based on its charge like it works in HIV, Hepatitis viruses, etc [29] [30].

Functional Polymers
The Prep FilerTM is a new kit recently introduced by Applied Bio-systems for DNA extraction from a wide range of forensic samples. This kit was tested for the performance against other commonly used commercially available kits on a variety of real forensic casework samples: bloodstains on different substrates, washed bloodstains, semen stains, saliva stains, hairs, bones, tissues, nails, and prints after chemical treatments, skin swabs. The Prep FilerTM kit is a new system developed for isolation of genomic DNA from a variety of forensic samples.
It uses polymer-embedded magnetic particles, much smaller than other ones that offer a large surface area with higher and efficient DNA binding capacity resulting in a maximum DNA recovery [31].

Polymer Nanocomposites and Nanomaterials
Research on highly effective antiviral drugs is essential for preventing the spread of infections and reducing losses. Recently, many functional nanoparticles have been shown to possess remarkable antiviral ability, such as quantum dots, gold and silver nanoparticles, nanoclusters, carbon dots, graphene oxide, silicon materials, polymers and dendrimers. Despite their difference in antiviral mechanism and inhibition efficacy, these functional nanoparticles-based structures have unique features as potential antiviral candidates. In [32] highlight the antiviral efficacy and mechanism of these nanoparticles. Nanotechnology has penetrated all aspects of virus research [33] [46]. Finally, more and more functionalized nanoparticles have been reported as highly potent inhibitors of viral proliferation. Since the first three research areas have been summarized and reported as shown in Table 1 [47], this focuses on the inhibitory effect of functional nanoparticles on viruses and the related mechanisms [47].

Nanotech Coating for Mask Fabric
The coronavirus, it turns out, is no different. Curran, a professor of physics at the University of Houston who is well-known for his work commercializing A process of fabricating the waterproof coating may include selecting a substrate, utilizing a sol-gel comprising a silane or silane derivative and metal oxide precursor to coat the substrate, and optionally coating the substrate with a hydrophobic chemical agent and/or other chemical agents to create a surface with nanoscopic or microscopic features. The process may utilize an all solution process or controlled environment for fabricating self-cleaning and waterproof coating that prevent wetting or staining of a substrate, or may utilize a controlled environment [48].