​During recent weeks, it has become distressingly apparent that there is a high level of confusion amongst the general public about which sanitising products are effective against the coronavirus.

Posts on social media, in particular, have often given incorrect advice and many are concerningly unaware that the products they are relying on to protect against infection are actually completely ineffectual against viruses.

The level of understanding is frankly woeful. So one of the leading suppliers of antiviral products to the healthcare sector explains what we need to know.

According to Ross Walker of Clinical Health Technologies: 'Using any sanitiser is a good thing, but many are no more effective than a thorough hand wash with hot water and soap. If you have been using an antibacterial sanitiser to protect yourself against the virus I’m afraid you have been operating under a false sense of security as antibacterial sanitisers are only effective against bacteria, not viruses. Antimicrobial sanitisers however are effective against a wide spectrum of microbes including bacteria, mould, fungi and viruses.

'Another misconception is that only alcohol is effective against viruses which is completely incorrect. In fact, alcohol is one of the lesser effective chemistries and has to be used in concentrations of at least 70% in order to be effective.'

Many alcohol sanitisers contain far lower concentrations than this.

By contrast the effectiveness of Clinisept+ against coronaviruses has been vigorously and independently tested and been proven to be highly effective in killing all enveloped viruses, including Coronaviruses, in under 15 seconds. This is 240 times faster than the recognised test for virucidal efficiency (EN14476).

Clinisept+ can be sprayed liberally directly onto the hands, face and surfaces to provide rapid protection against potential virus contamination.

According to Dr Sophie Shotter: 'I carry a bottle of Clinisept+ with me at all times – this is more than 99.99% effective at killing bacteria, fungi, spores and viruses in 15 seconds which is significantly better than alcohol gel. I’m using this to clean my hands, phone, spritz my face and my mouth”.

New chemistry

The product uses a new chemistry which has not been available for the general public to purchase up until now, but has been used in hospitals, medical and dental clinics. From this week the police and ambulance service have also been given access to it. It has also won awards for its innovation.

Clinisept+ contains a proprietary ultra-pure hypochlorous solution which enables it to provide effective cleansing at a fraction of the strength of traditional cleansing chemistries. Clinisept+’s hypochlorous has a unique oxidising method of action which cleanses and provides antimicrobial protection but is also completely skin safe. It doesn’t harm, irritate or sensitise the dermal layer. And because of the product’s oxidising method of action, pathogens cannot become immune to it, meaning it is not subject to anti microbial resistance.

The chemistry has undergone extensive independent testing proving not only that it is lethal to pathogens, but also the fact that it has a skin neutral pH, is hypoallergenic and is even non-cytotoxic.

As Ross Walker concludes: 'Clinisept+ truly is the holy grail of skin cleansing.'

Setting things in context

By the time this goes to print, the world will have made another few rotations, as usual, but it will be quite a different place: the streets will be even quieter than they are now, pollution levels will be the lowest they’ve been for years and many more people will have contracted Covid-19.

Coronavirus was originally something that was happening elsewhere, primarily in China, and then Italy. But just a few short weeks after we were reading about it there, it is now omnipresent in the UK. It now dominates the news, is the main topic of conversation, has already massively disrupted many of our working lives, and for some, has caused the loss of life.

The situation is serious and is only going to get worse. Anyone who thinks that it will blow over and that it won’t affect them should be prepared for a rude awakening – potentially in the form of losing a loved one.

The reason Covid-19 is so serious is that the virus is both resilient (there is no vaccine) and also virulent, which is why it has spread so quickly around the world. The speed with which a virus spreads is measured by its ‘reproductive index’, or R, which in layman’s terms, is the number of people that one individual with the virus will infect. If the number is greater than one, then the infection is spreading. If it is less than one, then it is in decline. Recent estimates have put the R index at 2.5, however it has reached well over 3 in China and Italy. This means that every person that has Covid-19 transmits it to two or three others, who each in turn transmit it to two or three others… and so on. Covid-19 is therefore growing exponentially and is not going away anytime soon.

To beat coronavirus, we have to get the R index down, to below 1.0. So how can we achieve this? There are four key aspects that influence the index: the duration that someone who has the virus is infectious for, the number of people an infected person comes into contact with whilst they are contagious, whether the contact is sufficient for transfer of the virus to take place, and the susceptibility of the people who become exposed to it.

Because we don’t have any medicines or vaccines that are effective against Covid-19, we can’t do anything about the length of time someone is infectious and neither can we change how susceptible we each are to the virus, and as we know the elderly or those with respiratory conditions are far more susceptible. However, we clearly can influence how much contact we have with other people and therefore how much we expose ourselves to the danger of becoming infected.

Put simply, if you don’t come into close contact with someone who has the virus and you don’t touch a surface that has been contaminated with it, you will not become infected. This is evidenced by China’s success in reducing the rate of infection by forcibly imposing (and ruthlessly enforcing) the most exacting isolation programme. In China, once people stopped coming into contact with others who had the virus the infection rate dropped and the contagion is now being more easily managed.

Available for the first time

Completely avoiding contact with other people and the surfaces they have touched is almost impossible, so frequent hand washing and sanitising with an effective virucidal chemistry is essential.

Clinical Health Technologies is doing its best to keep everyone safe and supplied with Clinisept+ but more needs to be done. The company has submitted evidence of Clinisept+’s effectiveness to the Government for fast-track approval for use against all enveloped viruses, including Coronavirus. This would allow Clinisept+ to be used more widely in a range of healthcare applications, particularly in the NHS, where it’s superior efficacy and safety would bring most benefit. In addition, Clinical Health Technologies has presented Clinisept+ for approval as a skin disinfectant to Public Health England and is also awaiting its response.

Plus, owing to the current shortage of plastic bottles in the UK and Europe, Clinical Health Technologies is also exerting pressure on the Government to prioritise and ring fence production of bottles for the manufacture of Clinisept+ to allow them to significantly increase the current supply.

For more information please visit www.cliniseptplus.com.

Author: