Home Health & COVID 19

Hi, this is Joe Konopacki with Insight Property Services with a couple of home health insights for you! Just a few quick tips or reminders for staying healthy at home.

First off, in these times of sheltering in place, like you are hearing on the news, you want to make sure that we are cleaning with simple soap. That's enough to break down the outer shell of the virus and effectively kill it. With simple soap we want to wash your hands, your face, and basically any surfaces that you are touching. As you may have heard, the virus is spreading through the mucous from our respiratory tract. So that is anytime anybody is coughing, sneezing, talking, or touching their nose and then touching something else. So those are the things that we need to be practically aware of.

As we all are told to stay at home more, we need to be conscious of the build up of CO2 that we exhale and the VOCs from the cleaners that we are using to keep the virus at bay. Be sure to let fresh air in the house. This is as simple as, every day, maybe a couple times a day, especially if it's nice out, open the windows to get some air flow through the house, or even better yet, go outside for a walk. Vitamin D, created by the sunlight is good for your immune system, fresh air is good. It's a good idea to get outside, keeping in mind that we want to still maintain some physical distance between us and anyone else.

Another reminder, is that over using disinfectants can be toxic. They are poisons in the fact that they kill the microbes that we don't want around our house. They have to be strong in order to kill all of the bad microbes. So, after we're done cleaning with our typical soap and water, we can employ disinfectants. They should however be used exactly how the manufacturer says. More is NOT better. In fact, the more you put down disinfectants, the more it's going to start to affect your children, pets and you. It becomes toxic in the dose. So at small doses you kill the virus at larger doses, you can kill yourself!

Another item that we have gotten questions about are our ozone generators, or UV lights to kill the viruses. Again the viruses are not largely floating around wildly through the air for hours on end. And even if they were, the ozone generators and UV lights are generally non effective. Much of the time the air is moving way too quickly in the duct system for either of those to be effective. In the case of ozone generators, those are really easy to overdo. When you get the house filling up with ozone (ozone is an oxidant, for which people generally go out of their way to avoid or take antioxidants), the ozone is attacking you as much as it is attacking the little stuff around your house. So using ozone generators or UV lights are way overkill and very hard to not overdo in some circumstances, and can end up hurting yourself.

Last thing I wanted to mention, and one of the most important, is about social distancing or physical distancing. We want to limit community spread. Like I went over before, this is a respiratory virus. This is going from one person's respiratory tract to another's. This can easily be from one person who comes in direct contact with another or being transferred to an intermediate surface, like from a doorknob to a hand to a face. So, for the greater good, please maintain your physical distancing. We all still want to be social, we still want to reach out to people we love, we still want to share our misery and share some laughs. We just want to make sure that we are not in physical proximity with others. This virus is spreading through the community like rapid fire. It is a virus that attacks the individual, and so the individuals have to do their part to limit the community spread. Since we have heard that the virus or an individual can be contagious for up to two weeks before they start showing symptoms, it would be a very good idea to just treat yourself as if you have it, especially when interacting with people who are at risk. At risk individuals include elderly, the unwell, persons with underlying respiratory conditions, and pregnant women. Protect yourself and your loved ones, isolate yourself as if you had the virus. You don't want to give it to your mom or your loved ones. Please everyone be safe, healthy, and mindful as we all try to get through this together!

Joe Konopacki

President & CEO

Insight Property Services, Inc.

(630) 283-2248