In March of 2020, when COVID19 hit, I was ready. This was the kind of threat I was primed for. I didn't need to buy N95 masks. I already had a supply. I had boxes of nitrile exam gloves, and bottles of alcohol. Also hydrogen peroxide. I'm not exactly sure where this hyper awareness of pathogens came from, but it definitely is a family trait.
Some of my supplies
When I was a child, we never 'shared' drinks. If someone had eaten from a plate, or used a fork, in my mother's mind it was 'dirty'. Her hyper-vigilance about spreading 'germs' might have been a reasonable response to her life. She suffered from chronic lung inflammation, so that catching a cold or minor respiratory illness was a major event.
Whatever the reason, that's the way I grew up. I don't think my siblings have it as bad as I do, except for one brother. He is even more obsessed with germs than I am and I believe he goes to battle with his wife for not observing his strict standards of hygiene. I can let it go. It bothers me to let it go, but I can.
A good example of my flexibility: years ago I went to the Bahamas with my husband, my daughter, and my daughter's friend. While we did not intend to spend lavishly (we never spend lavishly) on our trip, we did treat ourselves to one dinner at a highly-rated restaurant. The seating was booth style, and my seat was next to the wall. Early in the dinner, the salad course, I noticed movement coming across the table from the wall.
A roach.
This was our special dinner. We had a guest. We were having a good time. If I drew attention to the roach, everything would be ruined. We were in the Bahamas. Likely, every restaurant there had its share of roaches. Where could we eat and be guaranteed there would be no roaches in the kitchen, or elsewhere in the restaurant?
I shooed the roach away, off the table and continued to eat my salad. Throughout that meal the roach persisted. It approached my plate. I pushed it away. Nobody noticed. I was very discrete, and I ate. I just let it go. I'm sure as soon as we got up that roach invited its friends and had a picnic on the crumbs we left behind.
So, you see, I am obsessive, but not out of control. However, at home I give free rein to my impulses. Every now and then I look up a fact that buttresses my hygiene obsession. Today I read about someone buying second hand clothes. This is something I could never do. In my mind are the facts about the durability and transmissibility of certain pathogens. Mycobacterium tuberculosis came to mind specifically.
I refreshed my memory about the durability of this pathogen in the environment (as opposed to its incubation and latency in the individual). The following information comes from the Boston University Office of Research. I'll begin with the ability to clean an object that has been contaminated by Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It's hard to decontaminate once an item is affected. A quote from the website:
M. Tuberculosis has greater resistant to disinfectants and requires longer contact times for disinfectants to be effective
Microscopic view of Mycobacterium tuberculosis
A quote from another site (Health Estate Journal), addresses the inadvisability of laundering heath workers' garments at home:
Harmful bacteria such as Pseudomonas, Acinetobacter, and Mycobacterium were found to be living in the machines.
These pathogens persist because most machines do not wash clothes at high enough temperatures and do not maintain those temperature long enough to kill the pathogens. The site goes on to explain that household detergents allow certain pathogens to survive a wash cycle. Not only that, the pathogens learn to recognize the detergents and develop a resistance to them. The recommendation is that healthcare workers launder their clothing in highly specialized healthcare laundry facilities.
What about dry cleaning? That doesn't work either. A report issued by the U.S. CDC states:
Dry cleaning, a cleaning process that utilizes organic solvents (e.g., perchloroethylene) for soil removal, is an alternative means of cleaning fabrics that might be damaged in conventional laundering and detergent washing. Several studies, however, have shown that dry cleaning alone is relatively ineffective in reducing the numbers of bacteria and viruses on contaminated linens.
So, what about just putting the clothes aside and not wearing them for a while? I return to my first research source, Boston University Office of Research. How long does Mycobacterium tuberculosis persist in the environment?
Guinea pig carcasses – 49 days; carpet – up to 70 days; dust – 90 to 120 days; cockroaches – 40 days; manure 45 days; paper book – 105 days; sputum (cool, dark location) – 6 to 8 months; clothing – 45 days.
I hope my readers see that someone with my germ obsession could not comfortably wear clothing that had been used by someone else.
The germ phobia really does get in the way. My husband has been in the hospital a few times recently. I'm pretty informed about nosocomial transmission...that is, infectious diseases that spread in the hospital, so I am acutely aware of the risks from most environmental exposures. For example, the stethoscope--often called the physician's 'third hand'--is as contaminated with pathogens as it is ubiquitous in the hospital. An article in the science journal plos.one reports:
A total of 376 healthcare professionals’ inanimate objects were included from 191 study participants. Overall, 60.1% (226/376) (95%CI: 55.1–65) inanimate objects were contaminated. The proportion of bacterial contamination was (65.1%; 82/126), (60.3%; 76/126) and (54.8%; 68/124) for mobile phones, gowns and stethoscopes, respectively. Staphylococcus aureus was the most frequent isolate accounting (22.1%; 83/376) followed by Staphylococcus epidermidis (17.0%; 64/376), Escherichia coli (8.8%; 33/376) and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (4.9%; 18/376).
Picture of a stethoscope on which I have placed some creepy bacteria
I would cringe if a gowned healthcare worker came in the room and took out a stethoscope. When my husband came home after having a titanium implant inserted in his tibia, the visiting nurse threatened to quit because I hovered so closely. Every time she did not follow impeccable sanitary measures I would protest, because I knew one of the greatest risks he faced at moment was infection of the surgical site. I learned to keep my mouth shut but to prepare the treatment area before she came so that the risk of contamination to material was slight.
One would expect, with my germ preoccupation, that my house would be 'clean'. It is not, if clean means orderly. There are papers all over my desk. There are boxes piled in my closet. However, my bathroom sink and commode are sanitized every day. The same with door knobs and light switches in every room. Fortunately neither my children nor my husband share my preoccupation with germs, although they do respect my concerns. Whenever we leave a public place, my husband is never surprised when I pull a container of hand sanitizer from my pocketbook. He obligingly cleans his hands, and I diplomatically pretend I don't see the eye roll.
Thank you for reading my blog.
Peace and health to all. Hive on!
Image Credits: Supplies: My Picture
Microscopic view of Mycobacterium tuberculosis:NIAID Public domain
Stethoscope with Germs:Wikimedia Commons Public domain (Stethoscope); Unsplash (Germs)
