Battling Germs, Protecting Your Health

Germs are present everywhere from door handles to bathroom surfaces and desks, and they can make you and your associates sick. But routine janitorial techniques, correctly applied, will keep your building immaculate and protect the health of your workers, customers and clients. Our three-step plan takes on all microbial threats.

You probably don’t know this, but the locations of germs in your facility aren’t the ones you might suspect are the most filthy. In fact, some of those spots are cleaner and more germ-free – by many orders of magnitude – than the actual germiest places in your work place. It’s our duty to think of those locations for you and to make sure they stay pristine.

So it’s pretty likely that your bathrooms and toilets are the first place to start, right? You’ll be surprised to know that isn’t the case. Most restrooms and stalls are actually very sanitary given proper maintenance, but the handles on the sink in your break room and the buttons on any vending machines are not. Those cleanliness issues are compounded when workplaces have high traffic from the public.

So what are the germiest places in your office? A number of studies agree on these facts:

• The buttons or handles on water fountains
• The mouse or touch pad on your computer
• The desk phones throughout your facilities
• All elements of coffee pots and coffee dispensers
• Vending machine buttons and switches
• The handles on your break room sink faucets
• The handles of your microwave oven
• Computer keyboards
• The handles of any refrigerator and freezer doors

It comes down to how often those locations are contacted by hands and fingers, and it can be a very serious problem. The simple act of using soap and water to keep hands clean can have a major effect on the overall cleanliness of facilities. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, some 1.8 million very young children die each year from diarrhea and pneumonia each year, much of which is preventable by the act of hand washing and proactive germ treatment.

Testing during a 2011 study used a virus which doesn’t effect humans, MS-2, to analyze and contaminate high-touch surfaces throughout several office locations. The results were startling and showed that after half a day, traces of that MS-2 virus were found on the hands of 48% of the employees and after a full work day, those traces appeared on the hands of 26% of employees.

The first place the test virus showed up? The break room coffee pot handle. What it means is that the simple, common act of drinking your morning cup of coffee can contaminate an entire office staff within 4 hours. In another four hours, fully one-quarter of your office has been exposed.

To fight back and combat the spread of germs at your facility, you can suggest that your staff scrub their hands vigorously for up to a full minute before using common areas which contain food or drinks.

To keep your office in top shape, trust the professionals The Service Fort Janitorial to clean and disinfect all of your surfaces to keep the whole office healthy.