Running a backgroud while loop in a uWSGI/nginx deployment with Python/Flask

Question

Exerpt I have a webpage with a single button on it under a POST form:

<form method="post">
  <button type="submit" class="btn btn-outline-primary">START</button>
</form>

And in the Flask app I have a function that listens for incoming traffic (a while loop):

@app.route('/status', methods=['GET', 'POST'])
@requires_login
def status():
    if request.method == 'POST':
        print("INIT 1 HIT")
        data = Database.find('site')
        host = data[0]['host']
        port = data[0]['port']

        while True:
            xml = xml_builder.generate_xml()
            if xml:
                print(xml)
                len_xml = len(xml)
                header = connection.ip_header(len_xml)
                connection.send_tcp(host, port, header, xml)
    return render_template('user/panel.html')

The problem is, once I press the button the page will start loading and going inside the infinite loop. Thus, never hitting return render_template. uWSGI sees this as a timeout, and after 60 seconds will restart my app and I will lose the active listening for traffic from the while loop.

I read the official uWSGI documentation about reload-mercy, worker-reload-mercy, mule-reload-mercy, min-worker-lifetime, harakiri, and die-on-term for the uwsgi.ini file, but non of those seemed to be helping with anything and it also seems a bit like a hack.

My question is, how can I keep running the loop in the background without the page reloading or How can I actively listen for traffic in the background once the button is pressed and how can I still keep it running even after closing the browser?

The setup is working on a RaspberryPI connected by serial to an external device.