A Brave New World in a Pandemic

Coping with covid

Photo: CDC

For those in agriculture, nothing has stopped during the pandemic.  Food is life and for most, this means that Agriculture continues to operate daily to feed the masses.  In normal operations on poultry farms large and small, biosecurity has been and will be a normal practice.  What the pandemic has taught everyone else is what we need to do in order to protect ourselves from disease.  Operational biosecurity now needs to be practiced by everyone if everyone is to be protected.  Isolation (distancing), physical barriers (PPE), and sanitation routines (hand washing, surface cleaning) that were just germane to farms is now being practiced by all.  Until we have a working vaccine in place, all of us should strongly consider using sound biosecurity to keep themselves and those they love safe.  How well we practice these steps will show in the number of positive cases seen.

Keeping it Clean

The C is more important than the D

When we speak of biosecurity, many folks immediately jump to disinfectants, application methods, and types of surfaces you have to C&D (clean and disinfect).  But if a surface is not clean first, there is no hope of disinfecting well, especially if the surface is really dirty.  To make your disinfectant work better, be sure to clean the item you are trying to disinfect. 

source: columbia.edu

Dry clean and then wash in soap and water if possible.  The soap and scrubbing action will remove many of the germs that you wish to kill.  With a clean surface any remaining germs will be killed with the proper disinfectant.  So if I have to choose, I would pick hot water and soap over just a disinfectant on a very dirty boot.  Contact time and scrubbing will help with removing dirt from most surfaces.  I carry liquid soap, water and a shallow pan in order to wash my rubber boots from my car every time a make a visit to a poultry farm.  I always follow up with a spray of disinfectant to finish the job.  When washing hands, scrub with soap and water then use a gel to sanitize.