Efficacy of Soap and Water and Alcohol-Based Hand-Rub Preparations against Live H1N1 Influenza Virus on the Hands of Human Volunteers - ECDC Health Content
Scientific Advances ? Pandemic and Seasonal Influenza
Efficacy of Soap and Water and Alcohol-Based Hand-Rub Preparations against Live H1N1 Influenza Virus on the Hands of Human Volunteers
M. Lindsay Grayson,Sharmila Melvani,Julian Druce,Ian G. Barr,Susan A. Ballard,Paul D. R. Johnson,Tasoula Mastorakos and Christopher Birch. Clinical Infectious Diseases 1 February 2009, Vol. 48, No. 3: 285-291.
This article can be found here.
Description:
This paper describes experiments undertaken to compare the effectiveness of different routine hand hygiene protocols (hand washing) in inactivating influenza viruses. The study employed twenty vaccinated, antibody-positive volunteer health care workers who had their hands contaminated with 1 ml of tissue culture infected with live human H1N1 influenza virus before undertaking 1 of 5 different hand hygiene protocols.
These were: a control (no hand hygiene), a protocol based on washing with soap and water and three alcohol-based treatments with increasing degrees of alcohol concentration.
The concentrations of influenza A(H1N1) virus on the hands of the patients as well as the natural viability of H1N1 on hands for more than 60 min without hand washing protocol were calculated before and after each treatment by means of viral culture and quantitative real-time reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (PCR).
The results of the study found that there was a rapid reduction in culture-detectable and PCR-detectable A(H1N1) after a short (2 minute) period of cutaneous air drying alone. After which 6 out of 20 subjects had no viable H1N1 recoverable. There was also little further reduction in detectable H1N1 virus after 60 min. without washing. The antiviral efficacy for all 4 hand washing protocols was high with all four hand-washing protocols. All succeeded in making virus non-culturable. When looking at the PCR results the washing protocols did not eliminate all virus but they drastically reduced the amounts.
Washing with soap and water was statistically superior to the three alcohol-based treatments, although the difference was small.
The authors concluded that both soap and water and alcohol-based hand-rub were highly effective in reducing Influenza virus on human hands with soap and water marginally the most effective.
ECDC Comment (15/01/2009):
This is a reassuring finding that both soap and water and alcohol based wipes, if well used, will reduce the risk of influenza transmission through hands. The fact that some influenza virus was detectable through PCR does not necessarily mean that infection risk persists. PCR techniques will detect very low virus levels and non-viable viruses. The fact that both hand washing with soap and water an alcohol wipes was effective was important. This is because there are circumstances where alcohol wipes can be used but traditional hand washing is inconvenient. Equally soap and water is cheaper than alcohol wipes. However it should be remembered that though it is thought that hands (and fomites) can account for transmission of influenza and other infections the importance of this compared to droplet and aerosol transmission is unclear and the source of some controversy.(1)
Despite that regular hand-washing is recommended by ECDC as a method of preventing respiratory and other infections.(2)
1. Influenza Team, European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Influenza transmission: research needs for informing infection control policies and practice. Eurosurveillance (2007) Volume 12, Issue 19, 10 May
2. ECDC Personal protective measures against influenza 2006
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<cite cite="http://ecdc.europa.eu/en/health_content/sciadv/090115_sciadv.aspx">ECDC Health Content</cite>
Efficacy of Soap and Water and Alcohol-Based Hand-Rub Preparations against Live H1N1 Influenza Virus on the Hands of Human Volunteers
M. Lindsay Grayson,Sharmila Melvani,Julian Druce,Ian G. Barr,Susan A. Ballard,Paul D. R. Johnson,Tasoula Mastorakos and Christopher Birch. Clinical Infectious Diseases 1 February 2009, Vol. 48, No. 3: 285-291.
This article can be found here.
Description:
This paper describes experiments undertaken to compare the effectiveness of different routine hand hygiene protocols (hand washing) in inactivating influenza viruses. The study employed twenty vaccinated, antibody-positive volunteer health care workers who had their hands contaminated with 1 ml of tissue culture infected with live human H1N1 influenza virus before undertaking 1 of 5 different hand hygiene protocols.
These were: a control (no hand hygiene), a protocol based on washing with soap and water and three alcohol-based treatments with increasing degrees of alcohol concentration.
The concentrations of influenza A(H1N1) virus on the hands of the patients as well as the natural viability of H1N1 on hands for more than 60 min without hand washing protocol were calculated before and after each treatment by means of viral culture and quantitative real-time reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (PCR).
The results of the study found that there was a rapid reduction in culture-detectable and PCR-detectable A(H1N1) after a short (2 minute) period of cutaneous air drying alone. After which 6 out of 20 subjects had no viable H1N1 recoverable. There was also little further reduction in detectable H1N1 virus after 60 min. without washing. The antiviral efficacy for all 4 hand washing protocols was high with all four hand-washing protocols. All succeeded in making virus non-culturable. When looking at the PCR results the washing protocols did not eliminate all virus but they drastically reduced the amounts.
Washing with soap and water was statistically superior to the three alcohol-based treatments, although the difference was small.
The authors concluded that both soap and water and alcohol-based hand-rub were highly effective in reducing Influenza virus on human hands with soap and water marginally the most effective.
ECDC Comment (15/01/2009):
This is a reassuring finding that both soap and water and alcohol based wipes, if well used, will reduce the risk of influenza transmission through hands. The fact that some influenza virus was detectable through PCR does not necessarily mean that infection risk persists. PCR techniques will detect very low virus levels and non-viable viruses. The fact that both hand washing with soap and water an alcohol wipes was effective was important. This is because there are circumstances where alcohol wipes can be used but traditional hand washing is inconvenient. Equally soap and water is cheaper than alcohol wipes. However it should be remembered that though it is thought that hands (and fomites) can account for transmission of influenza and other infections the importance of this compared to droplet and aerosol transmission is unclear and the source of some controversy.(1)
Despite that regular hand-washing is recommended by ECDC as a method of preventing respiratory and other infections.(2)
1. Influenza Team, European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Influenza transmission: research needs for informing infection control policies and practice. Eurosurveillance (2007) Volume 12, Issue 19, 10 May
2. ECDC Personal protective measures against influenza 2006
-
Comment