SOAP KILLS THE CORONAVIRUS?
Are we doing enough?
Corona-phobia, the fear of novel coronavirus, is gripping the world. Though the consequential damage doesn’t seem as problematic as other menaces of the past viral spreads like MERS or SARS; the deliberate, unmindful or accidental dissemination of factually incorrect content via social media platforms has become a real problem in the present wired and click-happy digital society.
A Swedish psychologist, Arne Ohman, opined in his research findings that fear has been shaped by evolution as the primitive humans used to feel threatened always by environmental dangers and wild animals in prehistoric times.
This fear is instinctual because life system has got its own inbuilt mechanisms in the form of reflexes, alarms and alerts for self-protection.
Anyone who comes to know about the threat of corona contagion feels scared so as to use instinctual fear as a means of escaping or defending self. This is the reflex, which is generally referred to as irrational fear.
First Know How it Spreads!
- The virus is thought to spread mainly from person-to-person.
- Between people who are in close contact with one another (within about 6 feet).
- Through respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
- These droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people who are nearby or possibly be inhaled into the lungs.
WHAT IS THE SOLUTION?
Clean your hands often
- Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds especially after you have been in a public place, or after blowing your nose, coughing, or sneezing.
- If soap and water are not readily available, use a hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol. Cover all surfaces of your hands and rub them together until they feel dry.
- Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands.
And do I need to tell you Avoid close contact with people who are sick?
If you have to greet someone, then Greet With Namaskar!
Now you know that the best way to prevent the spread of coronavirus is to wash you hands
LET ME TELL YOU : Soap and water don’t kill germs; they work by mechanically removing them from your hands.
Running water by itself does a pretty good job of germ removal, but soap increases the overall effectiveness by pulling unwanted material off the skin and into the water.
In fact, if your hands are visibly dirty or have food on them, soap and water are more effective than the alcohol-based “hand sanitizers” because the proteins and fats in food tend to reduce alcohol’s germ-killing power. This is one of the main reasons soap and water is still favoured in the food industry.
BTW, What is SOAP exactly?
Soap is common phrase for what chemists call “amphiphiles.” These are molecules that have a dual nature. One end of the molecule is attracted to water and repelled by fats and proteins. The other side of the molecule is attracted to fats and is repelled by water. (If you’re looking out for product labels, the most common soap is “sodium laureth sulfate” — it’s a detergent that’s often mixed with other chemicals to both clean our hands and not damage our skin.)
You might have heard your loved once saying these days “Wash your hands — Just Wash Your hands!”
But … why?
It’s because soap — regular soap, fancy honeysuckle soap, artisan peppermint soap, just any soap — absolutely annihilates viruses like the coronavirus.
Now, lucky for us, coronaviruses are a bit like the oil mentioned in the above example: bits of genetic information — encoded by RNA — surrounded by a coat of fat and protein.
Thordarson likes to call viruses “nano-sized grease balls.” And grease balls, no matter the size, are the exact type of thing soap loves to annihilate.
Here’s how. This is what a virus, like coronavirus, looks like.
It’s a bit of material surrounded by a coating of proteins — and fat.
Viruses easily stick to places like your hands,
but when you rinse your hands with just water, it rushes right over the virus.
That’s because that layer of fat makes the virus behave kind of like a drop of oil. You can see it happening in the picture below. Oils are just liquid fats. What happens when you pour oil into water? It floats — it doesn’t mix.
add soap… And suddenly that fatty oil dissolves into the water.
And suddenly that fatty oil dissolves into the water.
That’s because inside, soap has two-sided molecules.
One end of the molecule is attracted to water, the other end to fat. So when the soap molecules come in contact with water and fat, these dual attractions literally pull the fat apart, surrounding the oil particles and dispersing them through the water.
Let’s go back to our coronavirus molecule. With that layer of fat holding everything together. When it interacts with soap … bam! The fat gets pulled out by the soap.
Soap literally pulls apart and demolishes these viruses. And then the water rinses the harmless, leftover shards of virus down the drain. But, you know where I’m going with this, it takes time for this effect to happen — 20 seconds, to be specific.
To show why, we have this lotion that mimics viruses and their fatty layers. It glows under a UV light.
If you just rinse your hands under regular water … nothing comes off. If you wash for just 5 seconds or 10 seconds, your hands are still covered. The virus is still here, able to get you and others sick.
But 20 full seconds: Now the soap is actually destroying the virus.
Hand sanitizer works too, because it’s mostly alcohol, and alcohol works in a somewhat similar way to soap, breaking down that fatty layer. You need a high concentration of alcohol to make that work.
So, Check the active ingredients of your Hand sanitizers. Look for something like this:
The CDC recommends hand sanitizers with at least 60% alcohol. But even with 60% alcohol, the CDC recommends using soap if you can. If your hands are sweaty or dirty when you use the sanitizer, that can dilute it and diminish its effectiveness.
As for soap, just any old soap works. You don’t need soap marketed as antibacterial, even. The FDA says skip it — there’s no proof it is any more effective. Just be sure to wash your hands. For 20 seconds. That’s “Happy Birthday” twice. Wash your hand just as long as it’s 20 seconds. And you’re using the ultimate virus annihilator: SOAP.
By just washing your hand and following simple steps mentioned above, you can do your part in making a difference!
Just make this resolve, if something like this happens to you, then it should not get to other via you. You must not be the medium for COVID-19.
Share this with your friends and family!
