Video: PSA Safe Grocery Shopping in COVID-19 Pandemic

[eleny]

An M.D. family physician in Michigan demonstrates how to deal with groceries and take-out food when you get home. Approx 13 minutes.

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[alwaysinasnit]

1. K&R Thanks for posting.

[eleny]

3. You're so welcome!

Husband and I did a lot of cleaning out in the garage before bringing groceries in, including dunking frozen sacks of vegetables in soapy water and giving them a good scrub.

He even sprayed the plastic bags liberally with disinfectant solution before taking them out of the truck bed and putting them in a cardboard box for me to grab and bring to my pail of sudsy disinfecting soap. Everything got the scrubbing.

But next time we're not only going to wear gloves but a mask to deal with all the cleaning because it can go airborne.

Safe shopping!

[alwaysinasnit]

9. Great tips! Thanks. Stay well.

[BComplex]

2. Big problem with this. I'm only a few minutes in, but I saw him spread the virus.

He took out a box of cereal. He had his hands all over the box, he opened it, and then reached in and took out the plastic bag with the cereal.
If a person before him coughed in the cereal aisle, and then he picked up a box that had droplets on it, his hands would have picked it up from the box, and his fingers then would touch the plastic bag, and he would transfer the viral droplets to that from his hands. Boom!

Anyone that took microbiology in college would be freaked out to see what he did.

[eleny]

4. I'm also tweaking what I saw

We wiped down our boxes, too. So I'll do that again and then remove the inner bags. I even gave a cardboard box of oatmeal a dunking as well as the ice cream container.

Thanks for posting. Generally I wonder if people are doing at least what he's advising.

[RhodeIslandOne]

12. That just goes to show you how insane/frightening this is

Imagine millions doing this whole routine, even more carefully than he is?

I can't.

I'm not criticizing him or you or anyone for the effort, but it is frightening.

[eleny]

15. Just an fyi - it took us a half hour to clean a large grocery order

And we did way more than this doctor.

[RhodeIslandOne]

16. Would you use the same disinfected paper towel for everything?

It seems to me there might be transfer???

I know you're going to say no, you wouldn't, which of course scares me more.

[eleny]

20. We used wipes on some things

We spritzed bags with a solution. And I dunked everything I could in a bucket of suds made with Dawn and cold water and rinsed.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

21. If it's still saturated, it's still 'killing' the virus -- none to spread.

To see how long you have to keep it wet, look up your disinfectant here:

https://www.epa.gov/pesticide-registration/list-n-disinfectants-use-against-sars-cov-2

[Squinch]

28. I actually use soap on everything non porous. I couldn't get my hands on

enough spray disinfectant and soap is easier to come by.

[marybourg]

5. I don't know why, but something in me balks at this level

of sanitization. If we had been doing this our whole lives we never would have the chance to develop an immunity to the many things most of us have some immunity to.

Possibly our brief and infrequent forays to the market is allowing some degree of immunity to this novel virus to build up., so that when faced with an onslaught- maybe someone sneezing right on you- our immune system will not be completely naive to the virus. I don’t know, but I instinctively recoil from this instruction.

[eleny]

6. My husband would die if he got c-19

So we do everything we're able to do and then we hope for the best.

The thing is, the experts say we have no immunity to it. I'm taking that as fact because we have to.

[marybourg]

7. I agree we have no immunity to it, because it's completely new to us.

But immunity can and will be built up to it, just as we’ve built up immunity to older bugs - by being exposed in our environment. But maybe your husband is not one who should be exposed to the tiniest amount of potential virus.

[eleny]

8. That's the only reasonable thing we can be guided by

So we go over the top like this physician in the video and then cross our fingers.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

11. We're already asking too much of our health care workers.

It's not too much for them to ask us to suffer a little inconvenience when they are risking their lives every minute they're working.

[eleny]

13. Another motivation, thanks!

[Hermit-The-Prog]

17. I hope a lot of people see that video. Thank you for finding and posting it!

[Hermit-The-Prog]

10. Thanks for this! This guy -gets- it.

Saw a couple of little glitches with some packaging (like the bread dump), but I think I could eat in that doc's house.

[eleny]

14. Yeah, and I worried that he handled the plastic grocery bags

We spritzed ours and will keep at it. Also, he wasn't wearing disposable gloves.

It took us a half hour to clean up a fairly large grocery pickup. A small price to pay for peace of mind.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

19. The way he opened the bread could allow the outside plastic to touch the bread.

Gloves are good if you have any nicks or scratches.

He would need to wash up to his elbows as I saw a plastic grocery bag rub against a forearm. (Information from Hong Kong, China and Singapore suggests it takes time to transfer the virus, but that seems an unnecessary risk for us to take if we're not on the front lines).

I would handle everything outside and only the cleaned things would go inside, after scrubbing my hands. Not everybody has that opportunity.

Something outside the scope of this video that should be considered is the fact that your car doors, steering wheel, shifter and key are likely contaminated after going shopping. I like the doctor's idea of considering everything covered with glitter. If you think of it that way, it's easy to imagine the glitter getting on everything you touch or brush against. Don't let the glitter get into your isolation bubble.

Our systems are adapting. We just need to try to delay getting or sending people into hospitals until these adaptations can take full effect.

[eleny]

22. We did a grocery pickup order

About that sack of bread, I would have spritzed it with our solution and then dunked it in my bucket 'o suds. Then a rinse of cool water.
It really only took a half hour to clean our whole order.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

24. That's getting it done.

We have some frozen chicken that was picked up about 2 weeks ago that will have to be treated as if contaminated. The worst part is that the inside of the freezer has to be considered contaminated, too.

[eleny]

29. He said something about the microwave

It was about reheating his fast food purchase. So maybe it would be good to research how well the microwave could kill virus in things like a whole chicken. He didn't talk about that. It sounds like a helpful thing to verify.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

34. Microwaves destroy the virus

This chicken will be boiled. It's the plastic wrap on it that has caused me some extra work, because the stuff was put in the freezer without cleaning that plastic first. Since the freezer is a good place for the virus to hibernate, I have to clean whatever that plastic-wrapped chicken touched.

[Silver Gaia]

18. I don't even bring the grocery bags or boxes in.

I have a couple of grocery totes that I know are clean. I take them to the porch. I wear gloves and a mask. On the porch, I take everything out of the grocery bags (or boxes) and carefully wipe them down with clorox wipes before placing them in my clean totes.

I am not all that concerned about inner bags, like with cereal. This stuff can live around 1 day on cardboard and 3 to 5 days on slick surfaces like steel or plastic. If the bag was contaminated before the box was sealed at the factory, I'm figuring that was more than 3 to 5 days ago. Outer surfaces are wiped thoroughly, though. This includes bags of frozen veggies, milk jugs, etc. EVERYTHING.

The grocery bags and boxes get tossed into a pile that will be put into the trash in a week or so. I clean my gloves and the outsides of the totes and their handles. Then, I bring the groceries in, strip off the gloves into the trash can, and put the groceries away. Fresh veggies get dumped into the sink where they are washed with Dawn (while wearing gloves). Then, the sink gets sterilized.

This is much more than most people are doing. I hope it is is enough. My hubby is also immune compromised, so I've been doing my best to protect him (and me).

ETA: I am not even going into stores. I'm fortunate to live in an area where I can shop online and either have it delivered or brought out to my car.

[eleny]

23. I'm a produce washer - since I was a kid

Dawn is our choice since it cuts fats. Given that the virus membrane is protein and fat, the Dawn would make it fall apart (according to Dr. Fare on MSNBC).

I let the produce soak and didn't use gloves to scrub. But I will now!

P.S. We can pickup, too. They put it in our truck bed. We didn't open a window or a door. It was very smooth.

[Mersky]

25. I recognize the burger unwrapping shuffle - did that last week

Last edited Wed Mar 25, 2020, 05:42 AM - Edit history (1)

I like seeing his methodical approach. Will likely reexamine how I handle fruit. Disinfecting sprays tear up the skin on my hands (am convinced it’s the methylizothinolinone in various cleaners, dish soaps*, and shampoos that’s the culprit), so I tend to minimize their use. Instead, I’ve been using a small pump bottle of 70% alcohol as my go to agent.

To replace some of the cleaning power of disinfecting chemicals I’ve been sunning my groceries.

Have taken to pulling them out of my plastic crate or bags and lining them up on the tailgate of our truck just inside the open garage away from direct sun, but still getting UV light. I turn and flip the items every fifteen minutes and mist or swab over them with alcohol. Plastic items get an extra going over with a disinfecting wipe. Cold items are taken out of a reusable insulated bag on the front porch misted, daubed and toweled off before being taken in.

Weather has been mild enough such that nothing has been heated to the point of sweating, etc. Colors on cereal boxes fade from the alcohol spray and wiping, but I’ve kept them thus far - when I get more in some weeks I’ll likely let them linger on the back porch for an extra hour.

The plastic crates get taken around to the back porch and are soap water sprayed/hosed, then allowed to dry on the porch until I need them to shop again days later. Canvas bags/insulated bags get Lysol sprayed and hang out on the back porch propped open and shifted every so often for a couple days.

I’ve switched to a washable canvas tote as a purse. I can’t afford to be lax about this as I have a young but medium to high risk individual in my household, and am a caregiver for my grandmother.

*I use pastel or clear Palmolive - works well and I generally don’t need gloves. Dawn is great, love it, but my hands can’t take it anymore. Developed the dermatitis after steam cleaning carpet.

[eleny]

30. I hope you can find some disposable gloves

I have slight dry knuckle problem so we've kept the gloves on hand for several years. And heavier ones to wash the hand washables. Our climate is arid so that magnifies the issue.

I like how you deal with fruit!

[Mersky]

33. Thanks. I have some

Didn’t need to stock up, as I keep them around as a matter of course. Also, I have a nifty pair of silicone gloves for big jobs. I may look at donating gloves, but have used some out of each box and I’m not sure they’re fit to be donated.

Will wear a pair when I run an errand tomorrow or for any future grocery shopping. I figured I’d relate that chemical, methylisothiazolinone, how it’s caused me trouble, and my strategies for how to deal with a chemical sensitivity. I suspect there’s a few folks out there with new cases of dermatitis, and it’s possible for them to use cleaning products/methods without damaging hands or using gloves every single time they need to wash or clean something.

(elbows)

[MFM008]

26. Terrific.

Did it all wrong yesterday.
I wore gloves but screwed up everything else.
Wiped nothing down.

[SammyWinstonJack]

32. Same here. I use wipes to pick up grocery items but haven't wiped anything down afterwards

[Mister Ed]

27. THANK YOU! We should all make sure THIS goes "viral". n/t

[Liberal In Texas]

31. Thanks for posting...sent it to some friends. n/t

[eleny]

36. A friend sent it to me and suggested I post it

Although we were cleaning our grocery pickup order, I learned some new things, too.

[Wednesdays]

35. K&R

Thanks.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

37. kick!

Don't forget to clean anything the uncleaned packages or bags touch.