The Canadian Men’s Health Foundation shares some practical advice on prevention from a virologist with coronavirus experience.
Take the necessary precautions
- No handshaking! Use a fist bump, slight bow, elbow bump, etc.
- Use only your knuckle to touch light switches, elevator buttons, etc. Lift the gasoline dispenser with a paper towel or use a disposable glove.
- Open doors with your closed fist or hip — do not grasp the handle with your hand, unless there is no other way to open the door, especially important on bathroom doors, post office boxes, and commercial doors.
- Use disinfectant wipes at the stores when they are available, including wiping the handle and child seat in grocery carts.
- Wash your hands with soap for 10-20 seconds and/or use a greater than 60% alcohol-based hand sanitizer whenever you return home from ANY activity that involves locations where other people have been.
- Keep a bottle of sanitizer available at each of your home entrances AND in your car for use after getting gas or touching other potentially contaminated objects when you can’t immediately wash your hands.
- If possible, cough or sneeze into a disposable tissue and discard. Use your elbow only if you have to. The clothing on your elbow may contain an infectious virus that can be passed on for up to a week or more!
Reduce the Spread of COVID-19. Wash Your Hands.
You can download and print this infographic and tape it to the wall next to the sink in common washrooms.
Get some of the following items
- Latex or nitrile latex disposable gloves (get the appropriate sizes for your family) for use when going shopping, using the gasoline pump, and all other outside activity when you come in contact with contaminated areas.
- Disposable surgical masks to prevent you from touching your nose and/or mouth. We touch our nose/mouth about 90 times per day without knowing it! This is the only way this virus can infect you as it is lung-specific. The mask will not prevent the virus in a direct sneeze from getting into your nose or mouth. It is only useful to keep you from touching your nose or mouth.
- Hand sanitizers must be alcohol-based and greater than 60% alcohol to be effective.
- Zinc lozenges have been proven to be effective in blocking coronavirus (and most other viruses) from multiplying in your throat and nasopharynx. Use as directed several times each day when you begin to feel ANY “cold-like” symptoms beginning. It is best to lie down and let the lozenge dissolve in the back of your throat and nasopharynx.
Source: James Robb, MD FCAP is a former professor of pathology at the University of California San Diego. He was one of the first molecular virologists in the world to work on coronaviruses in the 1970s and the first to demonstrate the number of genes the virus contained. Since then, he has kept up with the coronavirus field and its multiple clinical transfers into the human population (e.g. SARS, MERS) from different animal sources.
Check out these related blogs with easy-to-follow health tips for men and their communities during the coronavirus pandemic.
- Social Distancing and Physical Distancing: Which is More Important During COVID-19
- Take 2 steps back from other people, and 3 steps forward for good health: How to live healthier at home while kicking some coronavirus butt
- From tossing balls to drying them, these ‘guy secrets’ reveal tips for getting active during the COVID-19 pandemic
- ‘Epic Nachos’ do the trick when there’s a full house for dinner
- What’s easier than Just Do It? Just Show Up!
- Health checkups ain’t what they used to be. These days, they’re waaaay better!
Is it true that this covid19 virus can stay airborne for up to 3 hours?
It seems with ease of transfer that this is very possible.
I have watched a clip with a virologist saying that basically if you are sitting in the same room that you are going to get this virus with out sneezing and coughing?
Hi Jim, That is true. The COVID-19 virus may remain airborne for up to 3 hours and transmission is possible. That is why people, even if they think they are healthy and aren’t exhibiting symptoms of the illness, need to stay at home and only venture out when absolutely necessary. You know the rule: keep 2 meters apart in public.
Perfect
Thanks Guy. Hunker down and be safe and vigilant about following the guidelines.
Thanks
You’re welcome, David.
Funny how we are encouraging elbow bumping and sneezing into your elbow all at the same time. Those germs will make their way to the outside of the elbow when you sneeze as well. I would say elbow bumping is probably not a good strategy either. Just wave.
I feel that there is a risk that has thus far been overlooked. Starbucks, Drug Stores, department stores and restaurants, building supply outlets have all been replacing public washroom paper towels with forced air pressure dryers. The coronavirus is a respiratory disease and even if hands are washed (seldom sufficiently) and 99.9% of bacteria or virus is removed, the .01% will soon be airborne by hand dryers. I believe that this creates a risk that is not acceptable.
Delivery food and vegetables not in boxes. How to avoid covid contamination? I am confused why this article suggested disposable latex gloves instead of washing hands or hand sanitizer ? Who recommends not to use latex gloves at home but I am hearing we should be using gloves with deliveries arriving home and at airports. Could you please help clarify?
Best Livia
Great question, Livia. We are following the Public Health Agency of Canada’s COVID-19 guidelines. If you are going out in public and know you will be touching things like ATMs, gas pumps, and door handles, latex gloves are an added precaution you may want to consider. First and foremost, if you are out in public and touching objects, refrain from touching your face, and when you get home, the very first thing you do is wash your hands diligently for a minimum of 20 seconds and then go and disinfect any surface you may have touched when entering your home such as door handles. If you have a delivery at home after accepting the delivery, immediately wash your hands and then disinfect the delivery, if that is possible.