Water and steam that hot is likely to warp plastic, acetate, horn, and other scale materials. It would be very hard to heat the blade for a few minutes and not have the scales affected.
Disinfecting/sterilization question
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Water and steam that hot is likely to warp plastic, acetate, horn, and other scale materials. It would be very hard to heat the blade for a few minutes and not have the scales affected.
When all else fails, clean your razor, put it in a plastic zip lock bag, press out the excess air, seal it and leave it on the shelf for two weeks. Virus and bacteria cannot survive in this environment for very long. Most bacteria, virus' and fungi only last a few minutes to a few hours at most without moisture or a host. I really think that the odds are better of winning the powerball lottery than transmitting disease with a razor that has been carefully cleaned. I have shaved with almost 200 different straight razors and only a small few of them were unused by someone else. Do a good job of cleaning with common disinfectants and stop worrying. JMHO
Indeed. If there's an infectious agent that's that infectious doing the rounds we'd all be anxiously following updates from CDC in the news.
Soap and water - common washing up liquid would do perfectly well.
Faecal organisms being particularly problematic.
That's why I wrote: pour boiling water over the blade. There's nothing to stop him putting it opened into a jug or a glass full of boiling water. What he doesn't need to do is use disinfectants.
I didn't used to disinfect at all. Since y'all made me feel bad, I bought some barbacide wipes from Sally's.
Heat will travel up the tang and steam rises. This could easily cause issues with the way the scales fit at the pin. This is exactly the reason why razors that were made to be used in hospitals had steel scales.
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The linked CDC report does not remotely come to the conclusion that alcohols do not kill viruses, fungi and bacteria quickly and effectively. The talk about not penetrating protein-rich materials is referring to large chunks of matter (muscle, fecal matter, etc) left on surgical equipment, not the cellular membranes or organelles of bacteria and fungi or the protein coat of a virus.
This is why there is a long of viruses, fungi and bacteria that alcohols kill, mostly in 10 seconds or less, listed in the executive summary on that page (and quite a few more in the linked pdf of the full report) - it is a very effective disinfectant for all of them except hydrophilic viruses and certain spores:
A bunch of types of nonsurgical equipment were listed for which alcohol is an effective disinfectant.
Furthermore, on page 27 of the linked report 70% isopropyl alcohol is specifically recommended for sterilization in the home:
Note that the required time to sterilize is less for alcohol or bleach than it is for drugstore peroxide.
This is inaccurate. The FDA's coming ban of triclosan is limited to the antibacterial soaps where the combination of low concentration and low exposure time renders it ineffective - the antibacterial properties of triclosan in clinical usage are well-studied. Cf all of the following:
Schweizer, H. P. (2001). Triclosan: a widely used biocide and its link to antibiotics. FEMS MicrobiologyLetters 202, 17.
McLeod, R., Muench, S.P., Rafferty, J.B. et al. (2001). Triclosan inhibits the growth of Plasmodiumfalciparum and Toxoplasma gondii by inhibition of apicompexan FabI. International Journal ofParasitology 31, 10913.
Al-Doori, Z., Morrison, D., Edwards, G. et al. (2003). Susceptibility of MRSA to triclosan. Journal ofAntimicrobial Chemotherapy 51, 1856.
Suller, M.T. E. & Russell, A.D. (1999). Antibiotic and biocide resistance in methicillin-resistantStaphylococcus aureus and vancomycin-resistant enterococcus. Journal of Hospital Infection 43, 28191.
Tuffnell, D.J., Croton, R.S., Hemingway, D.M., Hartley M.N., Wake P.N., Garvey R.J. (1987). Methicillinresistant Staphylococcus aureus; the role of antisepsis in the control of an outbreak. J Hosp Infect.Nov;10(3):255-9.
Russell, A. D. (2003). Similarities and differences in the responses of microorganisms to biocides.Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy 52, 75063.
Ah the joy of forums! One comes across such a wonderful range of specialist knowledge - I do find this genuinely fascinating and indeed rewarding.
However I remain unconvinced - that is about possible risks associated with razors. Realistically there are microbes, viruses and all sorts of nasty things everywhere in the air and elsewhere. Part of life, and the reason that we have evolved immune systems.
Others may pooh-pooh my idea that the reason we have so many allergies around these days is the (in my view) excessive hygiene that is practised nowadays in so many areas. One simply didn't hear about all these things when I was young. Naturally if one's health is fragile in one way or another, one should indeed be careful, but I feel that for most of us this should not apply.
On another point made here, certainly high temperatures would of course damage Celluloid and other plastics, but I should have thought that a simple plunging of the blade into boiling water rather than a soaking would suffice. Steel is a poor conductor of heat so I doubt that damage would ensue. And provided one took care why not use bleach? That should kill everything surely?
C.
However I remain unconvinced - that is about possible risks associated with razors. Realistically there are microbes, viruses and all sorts of nasty things everywhere in the air and elsewhere. Part of life, and the reason that we have evolved immune systems.
Others may pooh-pooh my idea that the reason we have so many allergies around these days is the (in my view) excessive hygiene that is practised nowadays in so many areas. One simply didn't hear about all these things when I was young. Naturally if one's health is fragile in one way or another, one should indeed be careful, but I feel that for most of us this should not apply.
On another point made here, certainly high temperatures would of course damage Celluloid and other plastics, but I should have thought that a simple plunging of the blade into boiling water rather than a soaking would suffice. Steel is a poor conductor of heat so I doubt that damage would ensue. And provided one took care why not use bleach? That should kill everything surely?
C.
Because bleach absolutely destroys carbon steel, as many people on this forum have discovered, to their peril. Of all things, don't use bleach. It will oxidise like crazy.
Of course! Doh!
My mistake - lesson: never post messages until one has had the second coffee of the morning!
C.
About 15 seconds would suffice. Provided that the blade is free of visible contamination - for example blood.
As a general point if a surface and that includes your skin is visibly contaminated with blood, flesh, fecal material, etc any sterilising medium is going to have a hard job doing what its meant to do. This is why (for example) when decontaminating surgical instruments they are first cleaned then sterilised. Similarly in an operating theatre that has been used for a procedure upon a patient who is under isolation. The theatre is first cleaned and then cleaned again this time using a powerful disinfectant such as a bleach solution in some hospitals the theatre is then cleaned a third time to remove traces of the disinfecting medium.
No, please do post pre-coffee. There are new folks here that wouldn't know the perils of bleach (and some of us have a gnat's sized memory . . . . ) without these types of questions. There simply are (almost) no dumb questions.
Well that's generous thank you. However it does put me in mind of Keith Duckworth's (of Cosworth Engineering) remark:
"Better not to say anything and have people think you are a fool than speak and prove it!"
Rgds
C.
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Wow, I wasn't expecting so much information. I'm glad I asked because I've picked up a lot of information here. I wouldn't have known about the bleach prohibition, perhaps until it was too late. Thank you all for your continued input, and friendly debate.
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