The NY Times has an interesting article written by a doctor who claims, “I’m a doctor. If I drop food on the kitchen floor, I still eat it”.

He goes on to talk about studies (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16134485) that have been done on how ‘germy’ (my word – not his!) are various places around the home and office. They sampled many locations around the house and came up with measures of how ‘germy’ those surfaces really are, before any cleaning or disinfecting has taken place. Some of the results may surprise you!

The kitchen floor was found to have 2.75 colonies per square inch (of coliform bacteria). The refrigerator handle had 5.37 colonies and the kitchen counter had 5.57 colonies. He goes on to the bathroom where the toilet seat that we all think of as being so easily contaminated, only had 0.68 colonies! But the flush handle for that toilet had 34.65 colonies!

That is a great illustration of what are known as ‘high-touch areas’ – places where many hands touch regularly. These high-touch areas then, are places where our fight against harmful germs can make a difference. The refrigerator handle, the flush, lever, are fairly obvious places, but what about other high touch surfaces – such as your phone! “One study, for instance, found that about 95 percent of mobile phones carried by health care workers were contaminated with nosocomial bacteria. Of those contaminated with staph aureus, more than half were contaminated with methicillin resistant bacteria (MRSA).”

How about the money in your wallet or purse? Many studies have pointed out just how germy money is, but how often have you seen someone pay cash for a sandwich and then eat that sandwich immediately?

The ‘germiest’ thing around your home is most likely – the sponge in your kitchen sink, which was found to have around 20 million colonies per square inch!

Use SNiPER to disinfect or sanitize. Generally speaking, sanitizing is referred to as killing about 99.9% of bacteria (not including virus) on some hard surface within 30 seconds; typically, food preparation surfaces are sanitized. Disinfection destroys multiple organisms including bacteria and some viruses. ‘Disinfectants’ are regulated by the US  E.P.A. To be allowed this designation, you must demonstrate that the product kills 99.999% of selected microbes in 5 – 10 minutes.There are so many things we touch every day – atm machine, keyboards, light switches, steering wheels, and so on. We have been touching those places day-in and day-out for all out lives and are still here to tell about it, so really, it can’t be that bad. But if you are concerned about it, then there is something you can do.

SNiPER meets the disinfect standard when used full strength and allowed to dwell on the surface for the full 5-10 minutes. You can meet the ‘sanitize’ standard when you dilute SNiPER by 6:1 (Water: SNiPER). Typically for sanitizing, you can simply spray and walk away, allowing it to air dry.

We have instructions for how to sanitize your phone here, http://blog.nokout.com/clean-the-germs-from-your-devices-safely-with-sniper/. We also have articles for how to clean and disinfect your fridge here: https://nokout.com/Clean-and-Disinfect-your-Rerigerator.html, disinfect your kitchen https://nokout.com/Kitchen-Clean-Up-and-Disinfection-with-Nok-Out.html, and your bathroom here: https://nokout.com/Remove-Bathroom-Odor-and-Disinfect-too.html.

The Take-Away

If you have survived until adulthood, you have done so despite coming into direct contact with germs passed via the ‘high-touch’ areas, so in all probability, you are tough, with a strong immune system that protects you. But at certain times of the year, concern that illness-causing germs get passed from person to person increase. If it is being a difficult flu season, then perhaps an easy and effective way to limit the spread of pathogens is to treat the high touch areas with a good disinfecting product. (If you are worried about what may be on your hands, spray them down with SNiPER, and allow them to air dry.) SNiPER is the perfect solution. With it’s very low toxicity, its high efficacy and ease of application, SNiPER can help reduce the likelihood that some nasty pathogen comes into your home. Buy some today, because if you need it, you’ll be glad you have it!

If you have any questions, call Ted at 866 551 1927.

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