Articles about Keyboard Contamination

Targets Bacteria and Viruses on Computer Keyboards

If you’ve ever wondered how the flu, pink eye, a cold, salmonella, or even MRSA can spread so fast…the answer may be right at your fingertips

Although most of us might suspect bathroom faucets, a sneeze or a warm salad bar at the end of the lunch-hour crush to harbor a wide and frightening spectrum of bacteria and viruses, experts warn that one of the most hazardous sites where disease-causing contaminants may thrive…is as close as your fingertips – on your own computer keyboard.

The scope of the problem expands exponentially when you consider shared-use computers – like those in elementary school computer labs, in multi-user office settings, at retail checkout terminals, in college computer kiosks, libraries and especially in hospitals or physician offices where the bacteria and viruses may be more resilient and exotic.

Read more: New UV Advance Stops Hitchhiking Pathogens

Computer Keyboards as Vectors of Disease – A Problem More Serious than Previously Thought

It seems reasonable to think that the greater the number of people who touch a common surface, the greater the likelihood that germs will be transferred from people to the surface and from the surface to other people. One would think that restrooms, especially toilet seats and doorknobs, harbor the most germs, but this turns out not to be true. ATM keyboards were found to have more germs than a public restroom door, according to one researcher.[1]

Read more: Keyboard Germs: Ready to Travel... and Infect

Shared Computers, Shared Germs

Bacteria and viruses: perpetual contaminants

• Every year, 10%-20% of Americans become ill with the flu (influenza). (Source: Focus On The Flu: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease: NIAID).
• Expressed another way, approximately 25% of the population has flu-associated illness annually, leading to an average of 20,000 to 40,000 deaths per year.
• “According to health care experts, infectious diseases caused by microbes are responsible for more deaths worldwide than any other single cause. They estimate the annual cost of medical care for treating infectious diseases in the United States alone is about $120 billion.” (Source: Microbes in Sickness and in Health - Publications, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases: NIAID)

Read more: Keyboard Contamination: Fast Facts