Bacteria: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Introduction

Moving back into the workspace is stressful, and the new movement restrictions essentially mean you’re either at the office or in your home. Keeping these spaces clean is challenging – and COVID-19 certainly hasn’t made it easier!

Cleaning hard surfaces is easy as you just need to spray a disinfectant and wipe. But what happens with your carpets? Vacuuming regularly can keep the dust down, but the coronavirus can stay in the fibers for several hours and can be tracked into spaces where it’s more easily transmitted.

Now more than ever, we need to do our part to protect our loved ones, employees, and support staff. We also need to ensure everyone feels safe in the environments they spend the most time in, which also means that sometimes professionals are necessary to uphold the high standard of cleanliness that’s required.

How can carpet cleaning services help you in keeping you and your family safe?

The BCCDC has put out guidelines on disinfecting your home, recommending regular cleanings of high touch areas. But what about carpet? That’s high traffic too! The Blind Carpet Cleaner uses the Gold Standard of carpet cleaning – applying a non-toxic solution and then using a hot water extraction method to effectively clean and sanitize. We recommend cleaning your carpets professionally every 6-12 months in order to get deep into the parts that a vacuum cannot reach.

Beyond carpets, our specialists are able to help with a range of tough-to-clean items, such as:

• bathrooms
• children’s toys
• dust mite removal
• floors
• kitchen appliances
• mattresses
• outdoor furniture
• pet care & odour removal
• stairs
• hallways
• and area rugs

Beyond COVID-19, other types of bacteria still exist in your home!

Regular steam cleaning of carpets and upholstery is an important step to help prevent the transmission of infection, including COVID-19 – but it provides additional benefits beyond the pandemic.

COVID-19 has taken over headlines, and rightly so. This doesn’t mean you should stop thinking about the other types of bacteria, mites, and dust that can build up in your home.

The golden age of antibiotics is over, and broad spectrum antibiotics are not as effective, meaning we have to save them for when we really need them. In other words, we now have smarter bacteria! Health authorities and advocacy groups are now focussing on prevention of infection, including handwashing and regular cleaning of surfaces.

In this article, we’ll go over a few topics that highlight the importance of cleanliness for prevention of illness and allergies, including:

• Most common bacteria found on your home
• The most common places to find bacteria in your home
• Keeping your employees healthy at work, COVID-19 and beyond

Bacteria development in the home

Bacteria aren’t all bad, and some are good for your health. However, there are many bacterias that can cause a variety of illnesses. These are some of the most common bacteria that can be found, along with their negative health outcomes.

Staph bacteria

Fun fact: Most staph bacteria types are completely harmless! There’s a range of staph bacteria types from harmless to harmful that live on you and nearly every surface you use. They can also survive with or without oxygen.

If you become infected with harmful staph bacteria the outcome can range from a few symptoms requiring no treatment, all the way up to pneumonia and sepsis.

E. coli

You’ve probably heard E. coli when watching the news. Lakes and beaches close based on their levels of E. coli, and food outbreaks are declared when it’s found on food (think back to the romaine lettuce recall earlier this year.)

Much like staph bacteria, E. coli is mostly harmless, but an important marker of contamination for biologists. It can be found on meat, vegetables, soil, and bodies of water. The more harmful strains can cause diarrhea, pneumonia, and urinary tract infections. Young children and the elderly are more negatively affected. It’s important to keep kitchen surfaces clean and disinfected on a regular basis!

Salmonella

Salmonella got its name from its discoverer, Dr. Daniel E. Salmon (not from the fish!), and can cause stomach upset, diarrhea, and fever. It can be contracted through contaminated food and water or from interacting with animals (including their environment) that are infected.

Salmonella infection is often managed at home or through a short course of antibiotics, depending on whether symptoms persist. Salmonella illness is incredibly common and about 1.35 million Americans get it every year.

Pseudomonas

Pseudomonas are tricky as they are opportunistic, infecting people with compromised immune systems. They are found in soil, water and plants. This bacteria likes to evade antibiotics and become resistant, and are the most dangerous in healthcare settings, where they can enter the body through wounds or ventilators. Another common infection from pseudomonas is Swimmer’s Ear, which tends to heal on its own.

Where are some of the top places to find bacteria?

Bedroom

The bedroom is where you spend the most time in your home, and it also may not receive the same attention that your kitchen might! Here are a couple of places where bacteria can hide:

1. Mattress

Your mattress is an infrequently cleaned dust centre! It’s important to regularly clean your mattress to keep allergy symptoms down and prevent illness.

2. Pillows

Pillows have high concentrations of skin flakes, dust mites, old makeup residue, and bacteria. Change these, along with your sheets on a regular basis – and replace pillows every 1-2 years.

3. Children’s toys

Kids aren’t reading up on the latest infection prevention techniques, nor should they! Washing your kid’s toys on a regular basis is an important step to slow the spread of germs and infections, especially as they head back to school. Soft toys may need the additional touch of a professional, and our specialists are happy to help

Kitchen

The kitchen is rife with bacteria, as food is brought in from a variety of different sources. Here are some of the most common places to find it:

1. Kitchen sponge

The kitchen sponge is the rumored worst place to find bacteria (although it actually isn’t!) One of the best ways to combat bacteria is to regularly change out your sponge and ensure it’s wrung out fully in between each use.

2. Counter

Are you cleaning that counter with your kitchen sponge? Counters go through a lot in a day and need to be cleaned thoroughly after every use.

3. Appliances

Appliances have a lot of nooks and crannies that can hold bacteria. We go beyond the carpets and help you with surfaces that are harder to clean, including appliances. Ask one of our specialists how we can give you the gold standard of clean with our hot water extraction method.

4. Cutting boards

Plastic cutting boards have a porous surface that break down over time, allowing bacteria to grow. Use a bleach solution with a ratio of one capful bleach per gallon of water, and after running the solution over it, let it stand for several minutes. Wash with soap and water afterwards!

Bathroom

1. Bathroom mats + linens

Face cloths and towels should be washed as often as you’re able, as bacteria can grow quickly and contribute to breakouts on your face. It can also make your towels smell over time. Your bathroom mats should also be regularly washed. If they are too large for your washing machine, our specialists can clean your mats along with the other carpeting in your home.

2. Shower curtains

Shower curtains stay in a moist environment all the time and are challenging to take down and clean. They can develop black mold spots over time. Fabric can be cleaned, but it’s important to remember to do it on a regular basis. For the plastic insert, make sure it is not resting at the bottom of the tub where water can pool, and stay on top of the mold spots with household cleaners.

Pets

Pets don’t wear shoes, and they track in all sorts of bacteria in their paws. And if they have an accident on the carpet, it’s near impossible to get out all the mess.

Cats present a unique issue as they can track their litter throughout the house, and the dust is riddled with bacteria coming from urine and feces. In order to reduce bacteria spread, make sure you place a mat under the litter box in order to reduce the tracking of dust and ensure it is scooped daily.

How can carpet cleaning help?

Carpet is a moist, high traffic area that is an ideal environment for bacteria to thrive in, and can harbour dust. Vacuuming regularly can help keep the dust down, and regular hot water extraction cleans are additional insurance in keeping your space clean.

As Healthline says, dust isn’t just dirt! It’s a combination of many different types of chemicals, dust mites, dead skin, and other allergens that can affect your upper respiratory tract. It can also hold bacteria like the ones discussed above: E. coli, staph, pseudomonas, salmonella, and bacillus.

Ensuring that you maintain healthy lungs means limiting irritants and allergens. Vacuuming is helpful to limit the dust, but it’s not as effective as hot water extraction. Regular intervals of hot water extraction cleaning is an important step in limiting allergic reactions and irritation that can often be mistaken for COVID-19 symptoms

COVID + Your Workspace – Why you should be looking to your carpets to maintain employee health

With the current restrictions in place, our main places of gathering are at the office. High traffic areas are the riskiest for passing COVID-19, including hallways, doorknobs, and lunch rooms. Workplaces and employers have to make an extra effort to protect their employees when they’re in the office. Regular cleaning with a disinfecting solution is helpful for hard surfaces like desks, lunch tables, and bathroom surfaces – but they are ineffective on the carpet.

Recommendations for a safe workplace means identifying those that may have symptoms of COVID-19, and a lot of times these symptoms are shared with other illnesses. Your workers may have allergies, or sensitivity to dust mites, pollen, or other chemicals found in carpet. It’s important to ensure your employees are in top health – and minimizing allergens is a great place to start.

Carpet cleaning sanitizes, but it also helps remove stains and salt residue. Much like your home, your office needs to be cleaned and sanitized on a regular basis in order to keep bacteria at bay. This is why professional services are necessary!

COVID-19 is here to stay, and it’s important to acknowledge the efforts it requires to keep your family and workplace safe. The Blind Carpet Cleaner is here to make that a little easier. Not only do we clean the carpets in your home or office, but we also offer a number of professional upgrades for those that are looking for that extra touch in their space.

To Conclude

This article may make bacteria sound like another thing to worry about, but with good hygiene and a clean home or workspace, you can be perfectly safe. Regular professional carpet cleanings are an important step in maintaining a clean space for everyone who uses it.

Our specialists can help answer your questions and come up with a personalized approach to cleaning those nooks and crannies that are tough for household equipment to reach. We use a neutral solution that is non-toxic and then utilize our hot water extraction method at 260 degrees fahrenheit in order to kill 99% of bacteria and lift as much as 85% of stains from your flooring. We can even go further- you can add any of the following services for that extra level of clean:

• Mattresses
• Outdoor Furniture
• Pet Care & Odour Removal
• Stairs & Hallway
• Area Rugs
• Bathrooms
• Children’s Toys
• Dust Mite Removal
• Floor & Carpet
• Kitchen Appliances

Contact us to schedule your home carpet cleaning. Our professional carpet cleaners will work hard and diligently to remove viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens, leaving your home clean and safe for you and your family.

We understand that bringing anyone new into your home or office is stressful, and we want to assure you that we are doing our part to ensure that you and our staff are safe.

1. Our carpet cleaners wear disposable hospital grade nitrile gloves, 3-layer surgical masks, and over the shoe covers – which have been proven effective as a preventative measure against COVID-19.
2. Between client homes, all microfiber cloths, and scrubbing tools are replaced, ensuring that there is no pathogen-crossover between sites. The tools are returned to our premises where they are thoroughly cleaned and disinfected.
3. All of our carpet cleaning equipment, hand-tools, wands, cleaning buckets, and spray bottles are disinfected after each use.
4. The Blind Carpet Cleaner team members are provided with one step alcohol-based hand sanitizer, which they use regularly between homes.
5. The interior of our vehicle is disinfected on a daily basis.

We look forward to cleaning with you!