Can Common Cleaners Kill Warts?
Recently I have had a number of patients asking about how to clean their body, home, clothes, shoes, and more to avoid spreading warts to others. I try to reassure them that in my experience of 20 years as a dermatologist, it is pretty uncommon for a patient to pass a wart to a family member or coworker. However, this is the real scientific answer for those who need more.
Warts are caused by Human Papilloma Virus (HPV). It is believed that most infection with HPV leading to warts occurs through direct skin to skin contact. The virus enters the skin through a skin opening in the skin. Fomite spread, spread from inanimate objects, is more difficult to test and trace.
Over the past ten years, scientific studies have shown that HPV is a very resilient virus. It can live on objects for months and years. Luckily, actual human infection leading to a wart seems to be extremely uncommon unless there is extensive repeated exposure and breaks in the skin. The virus is everywhere, so it is hard to eradicate it from an environment and totally eliminate exposure.
Knowing that the wart virus can live on objects for years is cringe-worthy. What cleaners can be used to sanitize and disinfect areas and items suspected of contacting HPV?
First, I liked the discussion of this concept in an article on Pediatric Education.org. This article discussed the difference between cleaning, disinfecting and sanitizing.
Cleaning removes dirt, germs, and other foreign material from objects and surfaces. Germs are not necessarily killed but cleaning lowers their numbers. Cleaning usually involves soap, water, or variations of these.
Disinfecting kills germs on surfaces or objects using chemicals. This does not necessarily clean the objects and surfaces of dirt and other foreign material.
Sanitizing lowers the number of germs on surfaces or objects to a safe level using a variety of cleaning and disinfecting methods, as judged by public health standards or requirements.
PediatricEduction.org
The chart below is one that I put together to summarize what is scientifically known regarding the killing of HPV. As you can see, most common cleaners and household cleaners do NOT kill HPV. I have told patients in the past to just wash things and put them in the dryer. However, HPV can be resistant to that as well. Based on this scientific knowledge, I think common household cleaning and hygiene is a good idea. However, there is no scientific data to support cleaning beyond these measures in a household setting. Luckily, as I stated at the beginning of the article, the spreading of HPV within a household is uncommon in my experience.
UVC light ranges from 100-280nm, but the most effective wavelengths at killing are 250-260nm. UVC works by altering the DNA of the virus by inserting thymine dimers. The use of UVC is sky-rocketing during the COVID era. Look forward to my upcoming post with more details on How UVC works as a disinfectant.
To learn more general information about warts , OTC treatments for warts and a discussion about How Contagious are Warts, see our prior post.
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Here are a few of the top references I used for this post.
Meyers C, Milici J, Robison R. UVC radiation as an effective disinfectant method to inactivate human papillomaviruses. PLoS One. 2017;12(10):e0187377. Published 2017 Oct 31. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0187377
Can Common Cleaners Kill Warts. www. pediatriceducation.org
