Is Soap or Hand Sanitizer Best for Stopping Coronavirus?

SEATTLE—Shoppers had ransacked the shelves of isopropyl alcohol. Clorox bleach or Lysol disinfectant? Nothing at one store, and selling out fast fast at another. Hand sanitizers, Purell wipes, Wet Ones? All a distant memory.

But worried shoppers at stores across Seattle’s King County, the site of the vast majority of 2019 novel coronavirus deaths in the United States, haven’t emptied out what might be the most effective preventive tool in the game: hand soap.

Erin Sheets, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Minnesota Duluth, told The Daily Beast that the exterior of the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is coated in proteins and lipids, or fat-containing molecules. This lipid envelope provides a protective cover, while the embedded proteins help the virus attack our cells, enter them, and replicate, she said.

Research on other coronaviruses has shown that “lipids play crucial roles at various stages in the virus life cycle,” according to one recent study. They’re so important, in fact, that scientists are eying viral lipids as prime drug treatment targets.

Lipids are, in other words, the Achilles heel of coronaviruses, and soap provides an effective arrow. It is a detergent, which allows it to bridge the gap between water and grease or other fats, Sheets said. (Americans of a certain age may recall the “Dawn takes grease out of your way” tagline for the dishwashing detergent.) Hand soap does the same thing through brute force: it essentially dissolves the lipid envelope of the virus.... ‘Cats’ So We Don’t Have To