Are you still washing your hands often and cleaning your phone screen and other gadgets regularly[1], or has that habit slipped? With the COVID-19 virus still burning its way through the population, it's a bad time to let good habits slide, especially given the results of a new study by Australian researchers.
The findings, published in Virology Journal[2], suggest that the SARS-Cov-2 virus responsible for COVID-19 can last for almost a month on glass, stainless steel, and both paper and polymer banknotes if kept at ambient temperature and humidity (20 °C and 50 percent RH).
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NEXT [6] PREV [7]According to the paper, "the persistence of SARS-COV-2 on glass and vinyl (both common screen and screen protector materials, suggest that touchscreen devices may provide a potential source of transmission, and should regularly be disinfected especially in multi-user environments."
It's not just glass surfaces either. Banknotes -- both the paper kind and the plastic polymer style used in countries such as the UK and Australia -- are also toxic hellstews.
"While other studies have shown that paper notes harbor more pathogens than polymer notes, this data demonstrates that SARS-CoV-2 persists on both paper notes and polymer notes to at least 28 days at 20°C, albeit with a faster rate of inactivation on polymer notes."
A previous study[8] had suggested that SARS-CoV-2 could survive for a few days on glass and banknotes, and up to six days on glass and stainless steel. Not as long, but think about how many times a surface could be touched in that time.
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