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In case someone reads your comment and takes it to heart: isopropyl alcohol is not as magic as you're making it sound. It is a disinfectant but isopropyl alcoho

In case someone reads your comment and takes it to heart: isopropyl alcohol is not as magic as you're making it sound. It is a disinfectant but isopropyl alcohol does not sterilize. Some bacteria and spores are not killed by isopropyl alcohol, and depending on the surface you are cleaning, it can be ineffective at even disinfecting. >Alcohols are not recommended for sterilizing medical and surgical materials principally because they lack sporicidal action and they cannot penetrate protein-rich materials. Fatal postoperative wound infections with Clostridium have occurred when alcohols were used to sterilize surgical instruments contaminated with bacterial spores. [1] It's probably fine for most household uses, but it does not sterilize like you said it does, and if you're trying to clean something that you know is contaminated by disease-causing bacteria (eg cleaning the bathroom after someone has had the stomach flu) or someone immuno-suppressed lives in your house, you probably should reach for something stronger. Isopropyl alcohol also, like you mentioned, evaporates quickly. You mention this as a benefit, but fast evaporation also means that you are likely inhaling a lot of alcohol particles as you clean, which is not good for your lung health either. 1: https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/disinfection/disinfection-methods/chemical.html https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/disinfection...

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JohnJamesRambo 9y ago
Alcohol kills most things very well. I'm a scientist that handles lots of nasty things like MRSA and gram negative organisms that have killed their human hosts and we spray our gloves with 70% ethanol and spray down our biosafety hoods with it as do almost all labs in the world. This is all moot probably because homes don't need disinfection (hygiene hypothesis implies you probably need the opposite) but alcohol will certainly kill most things. It would be extremely rare for you to need to kill exotic things like bacterial spores that need nuclear options like autoclaving to kill.
- DoreenMichele 9y ago
  Eh, the GP did mention provisos like immuno-suppressed individuals. That's perhaps more common than you think.
- txcwpalpha 9y ago
  As you're a scientist, I'd defer to your expertise, but I will mention that the situations where alcohol falls short are with spores and when cleaning certain materials. AFAIK, MRSA does not form spores, and so alcohol would work well for disinfecting it. Your gloves and hoods are also probably made of a material that is effectively cleaned by alcohol. On the other hand, C. difficile (a bacteria responsible for diahrea/stomach flu) does produce spores which are not killed by alcohol cleaners. Similarly, viruses like norovirus (also responsible for "stomach flu") are not effectively disinfected by alcohol, which is why I mentioned that if you're trying to clean up after a bout of stomach flu, you might want to reach for something stronger (like a bleach based cleaner).
  - st26 9y ago
    C. diff is pretty much only killed by bleach, and not something most people deal with frequently, or you know, ever. These seem like rather special cases to be bringing up.
    - txcwpalpha 9y ago
      What? C. diff is one of the most common disease-causing bacterias [1]. Other examples like norovirus or C. perfringens (another spore-forming bacteria responsible for stomach flu) are also among the most common [2]. They aren't special cases at all. 1: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0225-clostridium-difficile.html https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0225-clostridium-di... 2: https://www.foodsafety.gov/poisoning/causes/bacteriaviruses/index.html https://www.foodsafety.gov/poisoning/causes/bacteriaviruses/...
      - st26 9y ago
        Huh, I had always heard C. diff was a pretty common presence but very rarely symptomatic.

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JohnJamesRambo 9y ago

Alcohol kills most things very well. I'm a scientist that handles lots of nasty things like MRSA and gram negative organisms that have killed their human hosts and we spray our gloves with 70% ethanol and spray down our biosafety hoods with it as do almost all labs in the world. This is all moot probably because homes don't need disinfection (hygiene hypothesis implies you probably need the opposite) but alcohol will certainly kill most things. It would be extremely rare for you to need to kill exotic things like bacterial spores that need nuclear options like autoclaving to kill.

DoreenMichele 9y ago
Eh, the GP did mention provisos like immuno-suppressed individuals. That's perhaps more common than you think.
txcwpalpha 9y ago
As you're a scientist, I'd defer to your expertise, but I will mention that the situations where alcohol falls short are with spores and when cleaning certain materials. AFAIK, MRSA does not form spores, and so alcohol would work well for disinfecting it. Your gloves and hoods are also probably made of a material that is effectively cleaned by alcohol. On the other hand, C. difficile (a bacteria responsible for diahrea/stomach flu) does produce spores which are not killed by alcohol cleaners. Similarly, viruses like norovirus (also responsible for "stomach flu") are not effectively disinfected by alcohol, which is why I mentioned that if you're trying to clean up after a bout of stomach flu, you might want to reach for something stronger (like a bleach based cleaner).
- st26 9y ago
  C. diff is pretty much only killed by bleach, and not something most people deal with frequently, or you know, ever. These seem like rather special cases to be bringing up.
  - txcwpalpha 9y ago
    What? C. diff is one of the most common disease-causing bacterias [1]. Other examples like norovirus or C. perfringens (another spore-forming bacteria responsible for stomach flu) are also among the most common [2]. They aren't special cases at all. 1: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0225-clostridium-difficile.html https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0225-clostridium-di... 2: https://www.foodsafety.gov/poisoning/causes/bacteriaviruses/index.html https://www.foodsafety.gov/poisoning/causes/bacteriaviruses/...
    - st26 9y ago
      Huh, I had always heard C. diff was a pretty common presence but very rarely symptomatic.