How long does COVID 19 live on skin hair and nails?
If you weren’t practicing hand washing before, the centers of disease control and prevention reminds us now that Covid-19 is spreading that it’s one of the best ways to prevent getting sick.
How often should we be washing our hands?
But as often as we’re washing our hands, how often should we be washing, well, everything else?
As you sit cross-legged on the couch while working from home, or twirl your hair without even realizing it could you be carrying the virus on these other parts of your body???
This virus is only a few months old and we don’t know as much about it as people sometimes make it sound.
What we do know is it stays on hard surfaces like countertops for two to three days.
That’s an important element for understanding why we need to clean surfaces.
There are some studies that say it may remain suspended in the air for up to three hours.
This is new, preliminary data that may change any moment so that’s something we need to be cognizant of.
If the virus that causes Covid-19 can live on a hard smooth surface for days, how long can it survive on our skin?
The exact time is unknown.
It’s fair to say long enough to spread from person to person.
However really cleaning around and underneath your fingernails is just as important.
In fact if your nail polish is chipping after social distancing from your salon, you should pay extra attention to scrubbing those areas.
It’s not anything specific about gel or dip or acrylic or polish itself, but just the fact it creates more little crevices for the virus to reside in and then it’s harder to get that area truly clean when washing your hands.
Same thing with under the nails. You have to be pretty diligent cleaning those areas.
Hospitals don’t allow their employees to have long nails or artificial nails because germs can live underneath then even after hand washing or applying sanitizer.
So while you may normally love longer nails it’s more important to make sure you’re cleaning them well.
We know artificial nails are not good for infection prevention and it’s better not to have them.
As long as you’re washing your hands frequently continue twirling your tresses as you please.
It could be in your hair, but it would be hard to imagine unless someone actively cough and got droplets in your hair.
The most common mechanism for transmission is related to hands because we’re using them all the time, constantly touching things, and we aren’t even aware of it.
Then we touch our faces all the time without even thinking about it.
So if hand washing is the only hygiene changes to make right now, which products are the best for rinsing the virus?
Doctors agree that it’s less about what you use and more about how you use it.
That said, don’t rely on hand sanitizer, they advised.
People wonder is antibacterial soap better than regular soap?
What about sanitizer gels? Really just plain old soap an water is the best.
There have been a lot of studies that really don’t show any significant benefit to using antibacterial soap.
Hand sanitizer is the best if you cant wash your hands and you’re out and about, and you just touched the stair railing.
How long does COVID 19 live on skin hair and nails?
By the way that means soap and water for at least 20 seconds which is singing the happy birthday song twice washes the viruses off your hands.
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