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Medicine

No, Mouthwash Will Not Save You From the Coronavirus (nytimes.com) 186

Posted by BeauHD from the be-careful-of-what-you-read dept.
You may have noticed a rash of provocative headlines this week suggesting that mouthwash can "inactivate" coronaviruses and help curb their spread. While the news is based on a new study from researchers at the Penn State College of Medicine, it's important to note that the study focused on a coronavirus that causes common colds -- not the one that causes COVID-19. "Not only did the study not investigate this deadly new virus, but it also did not test whether mouthwash affects how viruses spread from person to person," adds Katherine J. Wu via The New York Times. From the report: "I don't have a problem with using Listerine," said Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University. "But it's not an antiviral." The study, which was published last month in the Journal of Medical Virology, looked only at a coronavirus called 229E that causes common colds -- not the new coronavirus, which goes by the formal name of SARS-CoV-2, and causes far more serious disease. Researchers can study SARS-CoV-2 only in high-security labs after undergoing rigorous training. The two viruses are in the same family, and, in broad strokes, look anatomically similar, which can make 229E a good proxy for SARS-CoV-2 in certain experiments. But the two viruses shouldn't be thought of as interchangeable, Dr. Rasmussen said.

The researchers tested the virus-destroying effects of several products, including a watered-down mixture of Johnson's baby shampoo -- which is sometimes used to flush out the inside of the nose -- and mouthwashes made by Listerine, Crest, Orajel, Equate and C.V.S. They flooded 229E coronaviruses, which had been grown in human liver cells in the lab, with these chemicals for 30 seconds, 1 minute or 2 minutes -- longer than the typical swig or spritz into a nose or mouth. Around 90 to 99 percent of the viruses could no longer infect cells after this exposure, the study found.

But because the study didn't recruit any human volunteers to gargle the products in question, the findings have limited value for the real world, other experts said. The human mouth, full of nooks and crannies and a slurry of chemicals secreted by a diverse cadre of cells, is far more complicated than the inside of a laboratory dish. Nothing should be considered conclusive "unless human studies are performed," said Dr. Maricar Malinis, an infectious disease expert at Yale University. [...] Even if people did a very thorough job coating the inside of their mouths or noses with a coronavirus-killing chemical, a substantial amount of the virus would still remain in the body. The new coronavirus infiltrates not only the mouth and nose, but also the deep throat and lungs, where mouthwash and nasal washes hopefully never enter. Viruses that have already hidden away inside cells will also be shielded from the fast-acting chemicals found in these products.
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No, Mouthwash Will Not Save You From the Coronavirus More

No, Mouthwash Will Not Save You From the Coronavirus

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  • But what about bleach? (Score:4, Funny)

    by bluegutang ( 2814641 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @02:03AM (#60634312)

    n/t

    • Yes! Bleach will kill it!
      • Ozone in the ass too!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gl4ss ( 559668 )

      I don't know but basically I don't think one would want to gargle with something that killed everything, even viruses, in your mouth and throat.

    • That seems to work [bbc.com]

      • He was obviously being sarcastic when he said that. On live TV.

        • Not so obvious. Yes, it's what the fans claim. But maybe you can't understand Trump's style of sarcasm unless you've been to ten rallies and understand the pacing of his patter. But from what showed on TV to the uninitiated, he was clearly winging it, unscripted, with stream of consciousness streaming out of his mouth and no sarcasm.

          However, *if* it really was sarcasm, why is that a good thing? Should a president, the leader of the free world, actually be sarcastic during a press briefing on a serious p

    • It not only kills the virus but whitens your teeth. A two for one deal.

    • I hear sitting in the Chernobyl reactor for a few days will kill off coronavirus...

    • Getsuga Tenshou?
    • Bleach is supposed to be injected, not gargled. Did they test mouthwash injections?

  • But it might save you from mask-breath. (Score:4, Funny)

    by h33t l4x0r ( 4107715 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @02:51AM (#60634374)
    Frankly, I'm not sure which is worse.
  • Can we as a society, please calm down and have a talk around the facts of COVID-19, which will hopefully put an end to this ongoing spectacle?

    All discussion about coronavirus is purely political now. In the US, the government is trying to say the situation isn't anything to worry about, to help get re-elected. In Canada, the government is trying to say this is the most severe crisis we've ever seen, in order to keep attention away from their recent major WE ethics scandal. Literally everywhere else, p

    • Re:It's only politics left with COVID... (Score:5, Informative)

      by CaffeinatedBacon ( 5363221 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @03:14AM (#60634392)

      The facts are: go check the trend of cases and deaths in literally any country, state, province, city, etc. in the world, and you will find the same story: as lockdowns have subsided, cases are soaring amongst the general population, but deaths have largely stalled since the end of May.

      Well your brain has largely stalled.
      Florida [worldometers.info]
      Texas [worldometers.info]
      Both are clearly at higher deaths than the end of May.

      Having largely mitigated the vulnerable populations, we are literally now tracking cases of a common cold virus - for anyone not in a nursing home, both the science and data say the human immune system has no problem dealing with this virus.

      You are getting desperate now. What a stupid thing to claim.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Evtim ( 1022085 )

        Bravo. Found two US states as exceptions. Why don't you take a look at Europe? In NL the infected numbers are now 9 times higher than spring but deaths are 10 times lower. And the part about nursing homes is absolutely correct.

        • Re:It's only politics left with COVID... (Score:4, Informative)

          by CaffeinatedBacon ( 5363221 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @04:08AM (#60634460)
          Is that the same Netherlands [worldometers.info] Where they had months of single digit deaths. Who are now averaging 30 and had 59 yesterday...
          If you're going to cherry pick an example at least pick one that matches what you're trying to claim. The average at the end of May was 20. It dipped down to zero and is already back up to 30.

          • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

            by theM_xl ( 760570 )
            Being in the Netherlands... You realize that just by population size you get a certain amount of deaths as old age eventually catches us all, right? For the Netherlands it's about 152.000 a year. And we count EVERY death where the person had COVID, no matter what ELSE they might be dying off. The RIVM (Dutch version of the CDC) has the numbers split by age and the vast majority of deaths we have is in the 70+ age bracket. This thing is horribly contagious but not actually all that great at killing people w

            • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

              by dunkelfalke ( 91624 )

              https://www.cbs.nl/en-gb/news/... [www.cbs.nl]

              "In the first six months of 2020, there were more than 86 thousand deaths registered in the Netherlands. This is almost 9 thousand more than in the first half of 2019 and over 5 thousand more than in the same period in 2018."

              So 10% more deaths than last year so far in the Netherlands. Most people seriously underestimate the sheer amount of people with comorbidities. It is likely not so bad as in the USA, where 40% of the total population have them, but my guess is, at the ve

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by theM_xl ( 760570 )
                I suspect obesity is the main difference between USA and NL, but that's mainly stereotypes talking :-)

                I'm very interested in how the numbers here will develop over the coming week or two - given the increased testing since the first round, the fact we have record numbers of confirmed cases doesn't bother me much until we see that reflected in hospitalizations and deaths. The current semi-lockdown we have here doesn't seem to be helping nearly as much as the one earlier in the year, so the virus is star

        • Re:It's only politics left with COVID... (Score:5, Informative)

          by dunkelfalke ( 91624 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @04:25AM (#60634488)

          Why don't you look yourself? We had 2-3 daily deaths in summer in Germany, but 44 yesterday. Spain had fewer than 10 deaths per day in summer, now they have between 100 and 200 deaths every day.

          What the fuck is wrong with you?

          • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

            by Evtim ( 1022085 )

            I just looked. Germany had moving average 7 days of 215 deaths at the peak of the first wave (with infection rate of 5213 moving 7-day average). Now you have 31 moving 7 day average (of course you picked the highest number of 44, way to go tiger) and 5813 of the infections. Thus at similar rate of infection you have 6 times lower death rate.

            Do not presume that anything is wrong with me, ignoramus! The GP and myself were comparing the first and second waves, not the summer dip (which is perfectly expected d

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by jbengt ( 874751 )

              Thus at similar rate of infection you have 6 times lower death rate.

              Similar rate of infections, or similar rate of those infections confirmed by testing?

            • You're seriously comparing the same day for infections and deaths? That's a bit silly.
              You know covid doesn't always kill you on the same day you are diagnosed with it...

              I just looked. Germany had moving average 7 days of 215 deaths at the peak of the first wave (with infection rate of 5213 moving 7-day average).

              Your numbers are just made up. [worldometers.info] From the 7 day averages, April 2nd 5837 infections was the peak of the first wave. And the peak in deaths wasn't until 239 on April 18 and 238 April 20. Over 2 weeks later. April 2nd was only averaging 120 dead.
              Now you are trying to compare the same days infections and deaths...
              You're 31 average deaths tod

            • Thus at similar rate of infection you have 6 times lower death rate.

              Yeah, that's because in February-March the disease spread widely before we started detecting it. So most infected people were never tested unless they got seriously ill. Whereas now most case chains have been detected already, and the people around them tested, so there are few undetected cases. So there are more detected cases per death right now, that doesn't imply there are more actual cases.

          • You've been able to read data off of a graph, that's the first step. The next is to apply some critical thought. Just based on standard mortality rates over a population of their size, 2,273 people die every day in Germany. The point is not that we should ignore those 44 deaths, it's that we know how to prevent most of them without any special measures put in place for the general population. Germany also holds quite true to the fact that case counts are completely disconnected from deaths, meaning it's

        • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

          by fatwilbur ( 1098563 )
          This is why it's all politics - you see people who normally demand logical arguments, bending over backwards to support an irrational conclusion. It's totally fair to point out some outliers in the data that have not followed the exact trend, but the poster is using those to support their clearly wrong position, simply because that irrational conclusion fits their political needs (and let's be honest, in most cases that's wanting to defeat Donald Trump). If Trump were not in office and an election right a
      • Glad you found some examples which did not fit the timeline I stated. Unfortunately for you, they help prove my overall point: the rate of deaths is moving in the opposite direction of cases. You can argue this means the virus is naturally evolving to be less deadly as viruses do, but we have limited evidence of that now, and strong evidence of breakouts among vulnerable populations. The data also shows the deaths are grouped in the exact same population as everywhere else on earth: people we've shuffled

    • If this was a disease with a serious risk of killing you and/or your family,

      I don't know about you, but it has already killed one of my grandparents.

      • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

        by Evtim ( 1022085 )

        In the last 10 years or so my mother lost almost all her classmates and friends (first the men, then one by one, the women) to....flu. Every winter when we talked over the phone she would say "Let's see how many old folks will the flu take away this winter and if I will survive to see the spring again".

        So, I really have no clue what are you trying to say or refute with that statement.

        Just like these re-infection cases, all the 3 of them (the lady in NL had a cancer and was after chemo - are you surprised he

    • Can we as a society, please calm down and have a talk around the facts of COVID-19, which will hopefully put an end to this ongoing spectacle?

      Instead of talking about "facts", how about instead you put effort into understanding facts (no quotations marks around it this time). It may make the rest of your post sound less stupid.

      we are literally now tracking cases of a common cold virus

      In case there was any doubt about your complete lack of knowledge about viruses and their mortality, you really put that to rest with this statement. You can count on one hand the number of people who die each year from the "common cold virus" (err I assume you mean the 200+ viruses), and they are pretty much all immunosupp

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MrL0G1C ( 867445 )

      Masks are insanity? No, you're very stupid, masks work.

      Freedoms? You are not free to endanger the lives of other people, freedoms have limits.

      It's not rocket science to say that if 10% of the population have had COVID then that's 90% who haven't had it and the death toll could potentially be nearly 90% higher (or a bit less with herd immunity) if the virus was left unchecked.

      • Your math is off just a bit. If 90% has yet to be infected then it cannot potentially still kill 90%. Simply put, if the mortality rate was 100% we would not be having the drama of mask wearing. You can bet your ass that if this was Ebola spreading like wildfire and having a pre-symptomatic period of seven+ days, people would not just wear masks, but full body condoms. The feedback cycle of something like that is immediately felt/seen/known. With ambiguity comes drama. You could do nothing and be one of the

      • No, you've failed to check the data and read past the big facebook headlines. First, you absolutely cannot claim masks are helping, because that data simply doesn't exist, and there are reasonable arguments they may make the problem worse. Studies on mask usage have largely been conducted in clinical settings, with trained professionals on how to use masks. Remember, contracting the virus through the air is extremely rare compared to introducing it to your body via the hands. Some prominent doctors have

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by MrL0G1C ( 867445 )

          Studies show masks stop 75% of infections between the public. Scientific consensus is that the virus is mainly airborne spread, not generally via fomites.

          "And no, if the remaining 90% of the population catches coronavirus, the death rate will not be 90% higher"

          It's simple maths stupid, that chart has no relevance. If 10x as many people cathc covid then 10x as many people die.

          Where on earth do you get your info from? Infowars? Fox? Facebook?

          https://www.thelancet.com/jour... [thelancet.com]

          https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... [nih.gov]

          ht [nature.com]

          • No, it's not simple maths. Interestingly enough I took enough mathematics in Univ to get a major in it, and have spent a lot of my time correcting people on their oversimplified and incorrect methods of extrapolation and "simple maths". Not all people are equal when it comes to COVID, which is the underlying assumption making your point wrong. Certain groups have higher fatality rates. Anyway, easily accessible data shows well more than a 10x in the total number of cases, without a commensurate rise in

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by SirSlud ( 67381 )

      In Canada, the government is trying to say this is the most severe crisis we've ever seen

      I'm in Canada - in Toronto even, which is having a tougher time of it than the west coast. And your claim is pure bullshit. Please go fuck yourself.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dbialac ( 320955 )
      Part of the issue is something like the headline above, specifically "won't". That is a false headline. The people who ran the study said it may help, but that specific virus wasn't studied. The correct way to phrase it for the NYT's headline is to say "may not". Something not yet tested isn't absolute as far as a yes/no. The washes described in the article might actually work against COVID, they just haven't been tested. We don't know. Saying it won't is just as much disinformation as saying it will.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tflf ( 4410717 )

      We know how to prevent excess deaths from coronavirus now, and it has to do with special precautions at specific facilities. Things like lockdowns and masks among the general population are nothing but insanity and politics anymore. We can all stop the mask-rage, and go on with our normal lives.

      |

      Only if you ignore the fact nearly every study is showing there is likely more more permanent damage being done to those who survive COVDI-19 infection, even children. It's still not fully understood, and will likely not be so for another few years. There is not reasonable certainty yet that a mild case of COVID-19 does not do damage to one or more organs, Besides the lungs, heart, kidney, liver and even brain damage have been observed among hospitalized survivors, creating life-long health issues for the

  • Not Useless Either.... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by lobiusmoop ( 305328 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @03:05AM (#60634388) Homepage

    "But it's not an antiviral."

    "Several overâtheâcounter mouthwash/gargle products including Listerine and Listerineâlike products were highly effective at inactivating infectious virus with greater than 99.9% even with a 30âs contact time."

    So, which of these statements is true then? It sounds like a damn good viral prophylactic to me, with no down-side side-effects.

    • There are people who down-play the virus, but there are also those who up-play it. Both need not be taken serious.

      Mouthwash will help a little bit. Washing your mouth with a glass of rum or whisky will also likely reduce the number of viruses in your mouth since alcohol kills more than brain cells. It kills many viruses, too, and it will likely reduce the number of COVID19 viruses in your mouth as well.

      However, since COVID19 affects mostly the lungs and reproduces in there in large quantities will alcohol a

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gtall ( 79522 )

        "There are people who down-play the virus, but there are also those who up-play it. Both need not be taken serious."

        Ya, should be easy to figure out whether a person is up-playing or down-playing. We should develop a Serious-O-Meter with blinky lights telling us whether the person is being truthful. In advanced versions, it could be called a Lie Detector.

    • So, assuming its somehow tied to alcohol exposure combined with time, could that mean the 4hrs every day my mouth comes in contact with red wine or tequila can serve as some protection too? ;-) thats way longer than 2min. I assume inactivated and killed is somehow different and thats why they said not anti-viral.

    • Well, the second. Says right on the bottle, "Kills 99.9% of germs". Alcohol does the killing, and as anyone who has read a bottle of Lysol (also alcohol based) can tell you, that includes, "99.9% of viruses and bacteria". So logically, and especially if you gargle with it (virus grows in nose, will be in back of throat), Listerine will kill the virus in your mouth and upper throat, temproarially reducing the amount you're likely to exhale. How temporary and reduced by how much is the real question.

      I

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Maybe it depends if you breath through your nose or through your mouth.

      I suppose you could get a nelly pot and wash your nose out with mouthwash periodically.

    • Listerine et al are mostly alcohol, which is great at killing viruses on surfaces. It is also the main ingredient in hand sanitizer. Each would be considered an disinfectant or antiseptic. An antiviral is something like remdesivir or tamiflu. Kind of like how hand soap or bleach are good at killing bacteria but are not antibiotics. And no, mouthwash is not a good prophylactic. It'd kill the microbes in your mouth, sure, but it is like washing your hands. You're clean now, but there's no lingering eff

    • You could call it an antiviral, but only for your mouth.

      Even if you breathe through your mouth like I generally do (cue jokes, whatever, but my nose is fucked up) most of what you breathe in doesn't land in your mouth. It goes to your lungs. Cleaning out your mouth of the let's-call-it-5%-that-lands-there* isn't going to affect the let's-call-it-95% in your lungs.

      * If you have better numbers, let's see 'em

  • Answer is no, so even if it worked in the mouth it wouldn't help much...

    • You breathe in and out of your lungs at least half a cubic meter of air per hour. If that is full of virus particles how is cleaning the entrance now and then going to make a difference?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by fennec ( 936844 )
        I guess you'd have to keep the mouthwash in your mouth all the time! If you pinch your nose at the same time, it should solve the problem in about 2 minutes. Better ask someone to help you with nose pinching just in case...

      • The virus itself isn't airborne. So your breath itself will not be full of viruses. Rather does your breath contain tiny droplets of water and inside those droplets will the virus be able to live on for a while outside your body. So no, mouthwash will do little here. But if it kills the viruses in your mouth then there is less of a chance of spreading the virus through droplets of saliva, which can be rather big droplets, or sometimes drops.

        Of course mouthwash isn't not going to end all viruses. Nor are fac

      • It could be that most of the virus someone would exhale is in the mouth and back of the throat. Of course, it won't be long before viruses from your lungs and nose replenish what the wash killed, so I wouldn't expect it to help all that much. But, you never know, so I say experiments should be performed.

      • Contact exposure. If touching a surface, and later putting your hands in your mouth (indirectly while eating), introduces a virus in your mouth, then a mouthwash could kill that virus if it came in contact prior to it infecting the soft pallet of your mouth. But as you said, its not the primary method of infection, nor is it practical to use mouthwash every 30 minutes, Im fairly sure the soft tissue in your mouth would suffer damage from that much exposure. With viruses where contact exposure IS the primary

      • You're correct, the idea that swishing anything in your mouth would protect you from a respiratory virus is absurd. Unless, I suppose, it was an orally administered vaccine.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bazorg ( 911295 )

      Mouthwash for the nose is an interesting concept :)

      I use Vicks First Defence:
      https://www.vicks.co.uk/en-gb/... [vicks.co.uk]

      It's meant to make the nose less hospitable for viruses. They won't claim that it kills the SARS one, but probably won't harm if you try.

      • That's interesting - vitamin E and Zinc sprayed on a mucus membrane with antiinflamatories.

        Maybe not the most ideal or frugal route, but people won't take their vitamins so why not.

      • Hmm. That brings up a question Ive not seen answered. Does using a netti pot increase or decrease your chance of exposure? Does stripping everything out of your sinus cavity and replacing it with warm fertile saltwater solution create a perfect breeding ground? Or are you flushing away a bunch of virus trying to work its way into your body? We do know that the cells in your sinuses, like the lungs, are high in ACE2 proteins.

        • It's a virus. So it can't breed in saltwater, it needs a cell to invade and takeover.

          The question then becomes does saltwater help or hinder it from infecting cells?
          Maybe it slows the spread [pharmalive.com] But those people were already infected. Might just be like a mask and help lessen the chance of infecting others.
          It won't stop you from breathing covid into your lungs. But some that landed in the sinus could be killed I guess.
          I didn't actually read the details, I could be a bit wrong. Take it with a pinch of salt.

    • Yes! And apply ozone in the ass too!

  • Many people have been putting off dental work. Others have been brushing and flossing less as the pandemic keeps them at home and away from work or with less customer interaction. I'm concerned for children and families learning bad oral hygiene practices during the pandemic, and for those who expect dentists to treat years of neglect after they return to work.

    • Yes, the impact on the dental industry will be one of the unheralded tragedies of this plague. I'm pouring out a 40 for all the dentists and dental hygienists as I post this.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jbengt ( 874751 )
        My daughter was panicking last year as the pandemic caused the dental school she's in to close their clinic, making it uncertain she could get enough experience to graduate in spring 2021. They reopened it this year, with all sorts of extra protective gear and protocols, and still they don't get enough patients. None of her patients have had CoViD, but she did have deal with asking one patient to leave because he had bedbugs crawling on him.

    • My dentist's office added two new drive-through windows.

  • Inactivation isn't "killing".

    And ignorant people are conflating inactivation and killing.

    • >Inactivation isn't "killing".

      That is true, but a live virus that can't infect is probably just as good as being dead. Even though it would be a single location, the mouth is where most infectious droplets emanate.

      The real problem is that this study is just that, a study, not an actual experiment. Plus, even if it did inactivate 90 to 99% in the mouth (which is far from proven), how much utility is that? How long does that remain useful until the mouth is replenished with fresh virus? 30 min? One h

    • In the context of viruses the distinction isn't important.

  • No, I haven't (Score:3)

    by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Thursday October 22, 2020 @05:08AM (#60634532)

    You may have noticed a rash of provocative headlines this week

    No, I haven't because I don't go to conspiracy sites or the Fox tabloid.

  • Also it only enters through the ACE2 receptors in your nose. So there's that.

  • If I swill with Jack Daniels all day long will that protect me from covid-19?

    • Yes, it will prevent you from leaving the house.

      I think I'll use vodka as a mouthwash. For the record, I'm a swallower.

  • Actually mouthwash, and brushing your teeth regularly, has been tied to keeping inflamation down in the heart, decreasing heart disease. As some other tricks (vitamin D, Pepcid) have been tied to reducing the effects (not spread) of covid by the same mechanism, reducing inflammation leading to covid deaths, this might also be a reasonable benefit.

    Not sure where "reducing viruses in the mouth, ergo spread" comes from. Sounds more like a rationalization.

    In either case, first prove there's something to expla

  • Once Trump endorses it, it will instantly stop working and cause lots of horrible deaths.

  • They flooded 229E coronaviruses, which had been grown in human liver cells in the lab, with these chemicals for 30 seconds, 1 minute or 2 minutes -- longer than the typical swig or spritz into a nose or mouth.

    You are supposed to use mouthwash for 60 seconds for it to work. It says so on the label. I use it for at least 60 seconds.

  • But ... (Score:2)

    by PPH ( 736903 )

    ...no mouthwash does wonders for social distancing.

  • ...it might save you from garlic breath.

  • Don't believe any "study." Don't believe what idiot "journalists" claim is in a study. Don't believe what idiot "journalists" claim debunks a study.

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