return to toparrow QUESTION: Is antibacterial hand lotion as effective as antibacterial hand soap?
Antibacterial lotion is NOT as effective as antibacterial soap. Antibacterial lotion is typically put on unwashed hands and there is no subsequent rinsing of the hands. Antibacterial soap is more effective because there is rinsing of the hands. In fact, antibacterial soap is no more effective than regular soap. Washing hands does not kill microorganisms — it simply removes them from the hands. Therefore, scrubbing the hands will dislodge microorganisms from the skin and then rinsing thoroughly washes them away. Also, when you look at the label of antibacterial lotion, it typically states “kills 99% or 99.9% of MOST germs.” If there were 10,000 bacteria on your hands, killing 99 percent of them would mean that 100 would be left; killing 99.9 percent would mean 10 would be left. Depending on what organism was on your hands, this might be an adequate dose to cause foodborne illness. The other concern with antibacterial lotions is that it takes time to kill the microorganisms. The active
