The ever present need for hand gel sanitiser

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hand gel
hand gel

Alcohol-based hand sanitizers can help keep you safe and reduce the spread of germs if soap and water aren’t available. It’s also effective against the germs we can’t see too. This is just one of the reasons why they have really come into their own in the wake of COVID-19 and the world we now live in. It really has become an age in which we have all had to adapt. In the more recent times, we are in a time and age in which we now need to get on and live with the virus. With this, hand gel sanitiser is being seen more and more and used by more and more people also.

In our current COVID world, social distancing, face coverings, and regular hand hygiene are, for now, the new normal for all of us. More and more businesses are also investing in putting hand gel sanitiser in their premises. From pubs to bars and from factories and warehouses and in general, places of work, we are seeing hand gel out there more and more.

Being used more and more in the current COVID-19 age

In the global health emergency caused by COVID-19, multiple experts have mandated the use of hand sanitisers as a safety measure from COVID-19. The sale of hand sanitizers has increased many folds. Therefore, when there is such large use of hand sanitizers, it becomes extremely important to accept just how effective and useful they are in these times.

How they protect against viruses

Viruses are structural infectious agents that contain genetic material like DNA or RNA. Viruses are encapsulated and protected by a protein envelope known as capsid. In detail, viruses are further categorized as “enveloped” or “unenveloped”. Apart from the structural elements, it also contains a host cell which helps in propagation of viruses. A common compound in virucides is N-Propanol. It is believed that it damages the membrane of the virus and it affects its decoupling and protein synthesis. For effective virucidal efficacy concentrations of not less than 60% and not more than 90% is enough. Alcohol that contains not more than 1% water is less virucidal than alcohol in the ranges mentioned above.

Therefore, water is essential in the process of protein denaturation. Regardless of what processes alcohol affects, if not many, it eventually results in primary metabolic pathways, damage to the cell membrane, and loss of cell integrity.

Alcohol-based hand sanitisers

Alcohol-based hand sanitisers target the cover that protects the components of the virus. All the components are very critical for the virus. Therefore, it is assumed that after one of the components is targeted it may lose its ability to transfer from one host to another. This mechanism is compared to bacteria; it is observed that ethanol’s virucidal effect when compared to propanol is more effective against viruses of clinical relevance. It is also worth noting that in cases where only ethanol is not as effective against the viruses, adding acids can improve ethanol’s performance.

How efficient and effectively they work

It is harder to study viruses than bacteria. Many studies have tried to test the efficacy of hand sanitizers on viruses. Use of alcohol-based hand sanitizers are recommended by WHO for protection against multiple viruses. This includes the coronavirus as it has proven effective in quantitative suspension testing.

Overall

As COVID-19 has been exponentially spreading, the demand for hand sanitizers has also increased. This is with the pharma companies and others producing hand sanitizers in huge quantities. People started buying them as a personal prevention tactic against the virus. This has suddenly led to a huge demand for raw materials for hand sanitizers. Raw materials like isopropanol were sold at higher prices as there was not enough stock due to sudden increase in demand. The demand has been met by innovations by the producers in the hand sanitizer industry and hand sanitizers have been produced in record numbers. It will now be interesting to see how things develop onwards in the foreseeable future.

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