Omicron on plastic and human skin lasts longer than other strains

Omicron / Photo: Profimedia

The omicron variant manages to survive longer on human skin and plastic surfaces compared to previous versions of the coronavirus, Japanese scientists have discovered.

It is this extremely high "environmental stability" that is, the high infectivity and extreme durability that allowed the omicron to replace the delta as the dominant variant and to expand at such a speed, concluded Japanese scientists. On plastic surfaces, the median survival time of the original coronavirus strain was 56 hours, that of the alpha variant 191,3 hours, the beta variant 156,6 hours, the gamma variant 59,3 hours, and the delta variant 114 hours.

Japanese researchers have found that the omicron stays on plastic surfaces for about 193,5 hours, and the results have yet to be reviewed, according to the bioRxiv website.

On human skin samples, the mean coronavirus survival time was 8,6 hours for the original species, 19,6 hours for the alpha strain, 19,1 hours for the beta, 11 hours for the gamma variant, 16,8 hours for the delta, and - 21,1 hours for omicron. All variants of coronavirus were completely inactivated from human skin after 15 seconds of exposure to alcohol-based hand sanitizers.

"Therefore," the Japanese scientists conclude, "it is still recommended, as part of the current infection control, to continue the current practice of hand hygiene with disinfectants based on alcohol and soap, in accordance with the guidelines of the World Health Organization." . "

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