15 things dirtier than CASH (including your phone & gloves)
Did you know?! You can wash cash, or at least polymer bank notes, not the paper notes. If you're going to clean your bills, please also clean your gloves since coronavirus can last 2-6 hours on them. The grocery store till, your phone, cash, purse, etc., are all dirty; we've been using currency and going to stores or markets for hundreds of years.
Although the bank of Canada recently told retailers not to refuse cash, the WHO is announcing cash spreads the coronavirus; however, they're also notifying the public that “refusing cash could put an undue burden" on those who depend on it.
"When paying for your goods, use contactless debit or credit / tap wherever possible" - Retail Council of Canada
The Retail Council of Canada (RCC): is encouraging card or even contactless payment methods over cash; however, many surfaces in the grocery store, like the products themselves, are worse vectors/fomites than paper or polymer currency which stays in your wallet until point of sale. Unfortunately, retailers are following the RCC's advice rather than the bank of Canada's. The RCC has been talking about a cashless society since September 2019, right before the coronavirus outbreak. By February 2020, every store in town refuses cash back and has signs posted asking customers to use debit or credit whenever or if at all possible.
Depending on how fast your cash burns a hole in your pocket, all microorganisms could have died before you take your cash out of your wallet. Repiratory viruses can last hours or days (up to a week) on surfaces, but enteroviruses can survive over a month.
"Unlike bacterial disease, viral illness cannot be resolved with the use of antibiotics. Prevention and management of viral disease heavily relies upon vaccines and antiviral medications. Both vaccines and antiviral medications are only 60% effective. Additionally, to date there are no vaccines or antiviral drugs for most common enteric and respiratory viruses [common cold] with the exception of influenza virus and hepatitis A virus (HAV). Consequently, viral disease spread is most effectively deterred by preclusion of viral infection." Boone et al (2007)-
A study conducted in an office setting found that measures for disease control, such as providing hand sanitizer, disinfecting wipes, behavioural instructions, etc., was "shown to significantly reduce the detection of phage on communal fomites and hands" even when only half of employees participated. These measures apply to most microbes, and "unlike vaccination programs that are designed to reduce illness from a single pathogen, the [protocols] could simultaneously reduce the risk of infection for multiple pathogens" - Reynolds et al (2016).
Research in other areas, especially hospitals found these common items spread viruses and bacteria:
- Cellphones (the revered payment method)
- Doorknobs and drawer handles
- Sink faucets
- Refrigerator doors
- Nitrile and latex gloves
- Keypads: debit, machines, kiosks, ATMs, vending machines, crosswalks, etc.
- Crosswalk buttons
- Toilet handle and bathroom from aeresol when flushing
- Lamps, lightswitches and other highly touched items.
- Common outdoor items: Gas pumps, parking meters, escalator handles, and mailboxes.
- Nurses' scrubs
- Drinking glasses at a restaurant.
- Common items in Hospitals: countertops, handles, public phones and computers, linens, and medical equipment.
- Doctors' cellphones and purses, especially in the hospital
- The gynaecologists office maybe be contaminated with HPV
Gloves protect doctors and cashiers, but they don't really protect you unless you're not taking home anything that you've touched. Gloves can reduce microbe transmission, if they're frequently disinfected with alcohol. If you can sanitize your gloves instead of your hands all the time, you won't get cuts in your hands that let in more microbes than before. On the other hand, gloves can spread more disease if a careless person never cleans or changes them and feels invincible while wearing them, so they wipe their nose and then touch whatever.
The best way to reduce transmission of viruses, is the same common sense that you were taught as a kid (hopefully):
- Wash your hands before: eating or touching your face
- Wash your hands after: using the bathroom, returning from the store, or touching your mouth
- Frequent cleaning of commonly touched items
- Don't wear your shoes in the house
- Stay home if you're sick or immunocompromised
- Take your vitamins (aka take care of your immune system)
Plus some more new-age common sense like:
- Sanitizing your purse, phone, etc., when coming home from work
- Remembering to sanitize your other commonly-fondled new-age devices that you touch thousands of times a day because you're so damn addicted, like phones, computers, devices.
- Do your research: You can find up to date scientific studies on PUBMED about specific microbes or virology in general.
Unfortunately this isn't about common sense. I'm sure you can think of many contradictions off the top of your head, such as garden centres and photo kiosks closing, yet slurpee machines at 7/11 are still open. Or slaughter houses have to close because of workers getting sick, yet employees working side by side in a kitchen can still provide take out. Cashiers can't give cash back, but they can accept it (through a tiny slit in the plexiglass) right after they come around and put your groceries in the cart anyway. And store hours are reduced and extra entrances and tills are closed resulting in an ironically more crowded store.
This was a plannedemic whose goals have been in the works for tens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of years. It's a mass media hysteria campaign with mass amounts of deception at the goal of bringing in the cashless society New World Order. Your phone isn't a life-saving device, and humans have survived without them forever. Your phone is a tool to surveil you and control your mind. You're completely addicted in one of the truest meanings of the word, and you don't even notice. How long can you go without your phone? Do you feel safe without it? Are you bored after a few minutes of not using it. Do you eat with your phone? Do you take it to the bathroom and to bed with you? Enough said...
As long as technology is out of our control, it's an addiction we cannot afford to continue if we want our liberty and privacy.
Sources:
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