The developments of the past few weeks have made us all turn our attention to putting firmer hygiene practices in place, from washing our hands more regularly to using a skoosh of hand sanitiser when out and about.
But what about at home? Now is the time to make sure you’re ridding your home of germs as much as possible and we’ve put together a quick guide to help you figure out where to start and how to keep it up over the next few months.
First Things First
Before you start cleaning, wash your hands. You should also use gloves (which you can wash after your clean) but no matter whether your using gloves or not, give your hands a good 20 second wash with warm water and anti-bac hand soap.
You should also be cleaning down your high-level touch point surfaces every day; however we recommend a good deep clean to really kick things off and be sure you’ve got everything.
So, to start, strip all the beds and give all duvet covers and pillowcases, cushion covers and throws a hot wash, along with towels and tea towels. You might want to replace all your dish sponges and brushes, or leave them in a bowl of boiling water with bleach or disinfectant to kill off any germs living in them right now. Do this every day, just to be safe.
What if I can’t get anti-bac spray?
We are continuing to keep our shelves stocked as best we can with all essentials just like disinfectant spray which kills 99.9% of germs, and we have placed a restriction on purchases now so that panic buying has been curbed. Keep checking our stores for sprays and wipes, however adding extra elbow grease and scrubbing with warm soapy water should do the trick. You can get antibacterial washing up liquid so just add a couple of drops to hot water and you’re good to go.
What are high frequency touch points throughout the home?
Simply put, this is anywhere you touch with your hands more often than you realise. For that reason, they can be hard to pinpoint so it’s best to cover all eventualities. We have come up with the following list:
Take each room at a time and make sure you’ve got all touch points thoroughly with your spray/hot soapy water, but also generally given everywhere in the room a good dust, wash and vacuum to finish.
Save the bathroom for last and, as always, use a different sponge or cloth for these surfaces and as we suggested previously, leave them in a bowl of boiling water and bleach or disinfectant overnight to kill off the germs.
Finally, to make sure you keep your home as germ free as possible – stay at home! Follow the government’s advice about going out, keep a 2 meter distance from anyone else and, if you do have to go out, take off your shoes, hang up your coat and go and wash your hands as soon as you get in.
*This blog is not endorsed by the Public Health Agency or any Government department. Please continue to check Gov.uk/coronavirus, Public Health Agency and the NI Department of Health for the most up to date advice surrounding the Coronavirus outbreak.