Can hand soap kill the coronavirus? - Earth.com

Can hand soap kill the coronavirus?

04-07-2020


Today’s Video of the Day from the American Chemical Society investigates whether washing your hands with soap is an effective way to kill the coronavirus.

Dr. Palli Thordarson is a professor of Chemistry at the University of New South Wales. He explains that soap contains amphiphilic substances that are capable of suspending the virus so that it can be removed. 

According to Dr. Thordarson, hand soap completely destabilizes the non-covalent interactions that hold viruses together, while water alone is not nearly as effective. 

It’s impossible to find any hand sanitizer at stores these days, but there are plenty of bars of soap on grocery store shelves.

And there’s a little known secret about good, old-fashioned soap, even if it’s the cheap, generic kind.

It works better than hand sanitizer to remove the coronavirus. So you ask Can hand soap kill the coronavirus? Studies do show the effectiveness of it

By Chrissy Sexton, Earth.com Staff Writer

Video Credit: American Chemical Society

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