If hand sanitizer kills 99.9% of germs, what stops us from using that all of the time instead of hand washing?
In: Biology
It’s total false advertising. Read the label on what 99.9% of germs it kills. It’s a very small list of germs. Hand sanitizer is a sham. Use soap and water.
Soap acts as an emulsifier which lifts dirt and oil that otherwise don’t mix with water off of the skin, while hand sanitizer only has germ killing properties. A mechanic for example is just as interested with getting non water soluble oils off of his hands as disinfecting therefore would much rather a soap than alcohol.
Oh! I have a really good answer for that!
Taken C. diff. for example. It’s a somewhat common bacteria that you can get mostly at hospitals, but really anywhere (it causes horrible diarrhea).
It’s not affected by alcohol-based sanitizers. In fact, bleach is the only thing that kills it.
So washing your hands is a really good way at making sure you don’t get infected by it.
I can hardly believe no one has addressed the cost difference between soap and water vs alcohol. Beyond costs of production, there is an enormous difference is the number of cleanings one gets out of soap vs alcohol. Logistical and storage costs etc.
Cost differences between the two materials are the main driver in soaps popularity.
Excuse germs mutate, and eventually can grow an immunity to such things. It’s best to use sparingly for this reason.
Hand sanitizer contains chemicals that are toxic to many plants and animals. We don’t want to be putting a lot of it down our drains where it goes into the oceans and hurts wildlife. In nature we need bacteria so we don’t want a lot of this in nature.
We also need bacteria on our skin. The sanitizer kills all bacteria allowing the harmful to thrive. Keeping a good balance on the skin is important.
If I accidentally get dogshit on my hand, I don’t want to just have sanitized dogshit on my hand. I want soap and water to wash it away.
There’s more dogshit out in the world than we want to know about.
Killing is not the same as removing. Also oils and dirt aren’t living. All that crap just stays on your hands.
Hand sanitizer doesn’t remove dirt and oil from your skin, even if it does kill germs just like (proper) hand washing
Sanitizer doesn’t ‘clean’ your hands. If you have dirt all over them and sanitize, then you have “relatively” germ free, dirty hands.
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