If you’ve been wiping down the counters and doorknobs in your home with disinfectants every few hours for the last year, you can relax a little bit.
Updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggests that cleaning with good old soap and water once a day is sufficient in most cases to protect against the spread of COVID-19.
That’s if no one in your house has or is suspected of having the coronavirus.
"So much has been spent on people trying to clean their groceries or clean their mail for really no reason at all," said Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. "There was a lot of ‘hygiene theater’ that was going on and this helps to dispel people of those notions."
Of course, the novel coronavirus can still land on surfaces like countertops, doorknobs and tables, however the risk of transmission from them is low, according to the CDC.
"This virus doesn’t jump off the surface and bite you," said Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Dr. William Schaffner. "It has to be touched by your hands. If we do good hand hygiene, we’re protecting ourselves."
The demand for disinfectants exploded when the pandemic hit with Oakland-based Clorox increasing production of its disinfecting wipes to try keep the product on store shelves.
Related
