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Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

cdc.gov

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Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#51

Post by snakeboy »

brundolf wrote: post #15
refurb wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well considering every public places seems to be disinfecting every possible surface every 5 minutes, seems like the message wasn't received?

I get the sense that's happening more for show: businesses want people to feel safe coming in; bragging about thorough cleaning procedures is a way of conveying that, whether it works or not

Why doesn't this reach a better equilibrium though? Consider store A who brags about disinfecting everything every half hour, and store B down the street who does the bare minimum to pass government regulations.

Shouldn't store B then be spending less money on "sanitary theatre" and can theoretically provide a marginally better service in ways that matter?

The federal government can spend however many billions of dollars for new TSA staffing and equipment, but that's because they're a monopoly in airline security. Not sure why in a free-market we'd have obviously sub-optimal outcomes like this.

(Sorry if this is naive, feel free to weigh in with harsh realities about how the real world works :) )

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#52

Post by jariel »

kirillzubovsky wrote: post #33

Sigh...

? Or likely the complete opposite in that most people don't have access to the direct science, nor have the ability to translate it into policy, and we rely on institutions and the medical community to set up the basis for behaviours, that COVID is real, it's literally killed 550 000 people of all ages in just 1 year, that anyone can get it, and that it's rational to follow the advice until indicated otherwise. And finally 'we don't really know' the specific nature of transmission and it's rational (and low cost) to be safer than sorry, and to wipe down surfaces.

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#53

Post by zo1 »

We're still sanitizing and/or quarantining everything that comes into our house from an unknown source. It's become a easy routine/habit anyways, and I've started to like that everything in our house is clean and I don't have to worry about it (have you seen how dirty groceries are?). Also, it's been the year of absolutely no flu, stomach aches and other various illnesses that afflict us in a seemingly random fashion.

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#54

Post by mrkeen »

hanselot wrote: post #11
dominostars wrote: post #4

I’m fairly certain information like this or similar was communicated very early on in the pandemic. A lot of people I know were sanitizing things from the grocery store for the first few weeks but then it quickly spread that surface transmission was very rare so everyone stopped.

Talk a world of bull**, every single place in my country has hand sanitizer and cleans every surface religiously. Watch them astroturf their megaplague to hide the fact that they were distracting the world from Maxwell and Epstein.

How do you link hand sanitizer to Maxwell and Epstein?

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#55

Post by abtinf »

hashhar wrote: post #26

The headline is very misleading. The actual text contains the relative risk of fomite transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is considered low compared with direct contact, droplet transmission, or airborne transmission 1, 2. However, it is not clear what proportion of SARS-CoV-2 infections are acquired through surface transmission.

“Findings of these studies suggest that the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection via the fomite transmission route is low, and generally less than 1 in 10,000, which means that each contact with a contaminated surface has less than a 1 in 10,000 chance of causing an infection.”

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#56

Post by verall »

kirillzubovsky wrote: post #33

Sigh...

> They are hiding, scared, waiting for the government to officially announce that it is once again safe to return to the world.

Would you believe that many of us are not scared, but rather that we decided based on facts about aerosol transmission that nonessential travel/social events put other people's grandparents at unneccesary risk?

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#57

Post by atat7024 »

zo1 wrote: post #53

We're still sanitizing and/or quarantining everything that comes into our house from an unknown source. It's become a easy routine/habit anyways, and I've started to like that everything in our house is clean and I don't have to worry about it (have you seen how dirty groceries are?). Also, it's been the year of absolutely no flu, stomach aches and other various illnesses that afflict us in a seemingly random fashion…

Just get UV lights, that's a lot of labor.

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#58

Post by [deleted] »

hashhar wrote: post #26

The headline is very misleading. The actual text contains the relative risk of fomite transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is considered low compared with direct contact, droplet transmission, or airborne transmission 1, 2. However, it is not clear what proportion of SARS-CoV-2 infections are acquired through surface transmission.

[deleted]

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#59

Post by _Microft »

kirillzubovsky wrote: post #33

Sigh...

There is a disease going around. It transmits by droplets that you cannot see. People can be infectious before showing symptoms or without symptoms at all. It affects some people at lot more than others. I don't blame people for being scared.

The winning move actually is not to play the social game for a few months. Currently, the best people are the ones you do not meet at all.

Re: Contaminated surface has under 1 in 10k chance of causing an infection

#60

Post by alcover »

ohgodplsno wrote: post #46
alcover wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as long as we're not sure, keep doing it There are diminishing returns in this caution principle, while the harm caused by the deluge of disinfection products on the environment and ourselves certainly adds-up. You can never be 100% sure you won't get infected through surface. By this logic you should spray sanitizers everywhere all the time .

Right, how could I forget being pedantic and thinking that pushing arguments to their logical extreme is an argument in itself. This is HN after all. Disinfecting and cleaning your hands (even with soap. Noone's told you to douse your hands in alcohol every hour of the day) is as much for your protection as it is for others. Additionally, you can expect an average person to wash their hands maybe three to four times…

That was pedantic indeed, sorry.

My main concern really is the over-cleaning of surfaces. Those products are nasty.

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