It's safe to say that the arrival of the novel coronavirus has made us more aware of cleanliness and overall hygiene in our daily lives. In fact, it's made us so aware that we're continuously buying up the go-to cleaning products we rely on, making them hard to find even seven months into the pandemic. Fortunately, it turns out there are more everyday products around your house that can effectively kill the coronavirus. New research out of Penn State found that antiseptic mouthwash and baby shampoo can rid you of the virus in under two minutes. The new research from the Penn State College of Medicine, which was published in the Journal of Medical Virology, tested various household products to see if they could have any effect on "deactivating" the coronavirus, including a neti pot, peroxide sore-mouth cleansers, mouthwashes, and a 1% solution of baby shampoo. While the former two proved to be no match for COVID, the results showed that the baby shampoo solution—which is often used by head and neck doctors to rinse out sinuses—killed 99.9 percent of coronaviruses within two minutes of contact time, while mouthwash did the same in just 30 seconds.The researchers say that the discovery could be particularly helpful in slowing the spread of the virus while the public awaits the release of an effective vaccine. "People who test positive for COVID-19 and return home to quarantine may possibly transmit the virus to those they live with," Craig Meyers, PhD, a professor of microbiology and immunology and a researcher at Penn State Cancer Institute, said in a statement. "Even if the use of these solutions could reduce transmission by 50 percent, it would have a major impact." Source
