{"id":48941,"date":"2021-01-15T22:26:24","date_gmt":"2021-01-16T03:26:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/?p=48941"},"modified":"2023-06-06T18:05:10","modified_gmt":"2023-06-06T22:05:10","slug":"disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/","title":{"rendered":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_7101\" class=\"thumbnail wp-caption alignright\" style=\"width: 224px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-7101\" src=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-214x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"214\" height=\"300\" \/><figcaption class=\"caption wp-caption-text\">Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, MS<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Constantly disinfecting doorknobs and other everyday surfaces to prevent the spread of COVID-19 may be overkill, according to infectious disease experts.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/directory\/emily-sickbert-bennett\/\">Emily Sickbert-Bennett<\/a>, PhD, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases, told <a href=\"https:\/\/abc11.com\/health\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/9624879\/\">WTVD-11<\/a> that disinfecting all the surfaces in your house may not be a total waste of time and money, but it isn&#8217;t the most effective way to prevent infection.<\/p>\n<p>Find the news story <a href=\"https:\/\/abc11.com\/health\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/9624879\/\">here.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Constantly disinfecting doorknobs and other everyday surfaces to prevent the spread of COVID-19 may be overkill, according to infectious disease experts. Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases, told WTVD-11 that disinfecting all the surfaces in your house may not be a total waste of time and money, but &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":69419,"featured_media":7101,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"layout":"","cellInformation":"","apiCallInformation":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[100,2],"tags":[630],"class_list":["post-48941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-infectious-diseases","category-news","tag-630","odd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Constantly disinfecting doorknobs and other everyday surfaces to prevent the spread of COVID-19 may be overkill, according to infectious disease experts. Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases, told WTVD-11 that disinfecting all the surfaces in your house may not be a total waste of time and money, but &hellip; Read more\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Department of Medicine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/UNCDeptMedicine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"237\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"290\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kim Morris\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@uncdeptmedicine\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@uncdeptmedicine\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Kim Morris\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Kim Morris\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529\"},\"headline\":\"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\"},\"wordCount\":92,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"2021\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Infectious Diseases\",\"News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\",\"name\":\"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg\",\"width\":237,\"height\":290,\"caption\":\"Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, MS\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/\",\"name\":\"Department of Medicine\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529\",\"name\":\"Kim Morris\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/95c34b3e4d55a602b94260bccc6350c2ddfdde901530a734fe6c8fa9e3a5d399?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/95c34b3e4d55a602b94260bccc6350c2ddfdde901530a734fe6c8fa9e3a5d399?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Kim Morris\"},\"description\":\"Medicine - Dept of\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/author\/kcmorris\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine","og_description":"Constantly disinfecting doorknobs and other everyday surfaces to prevent the spread of COVID-19 may be overkill, according to infectious disease experts. Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases, told WTVD-11 that disinfecting all the surfaces in your house may not be a total waste of time and money, but &hellip; Read more","og_url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/","og_site_name":"Department of Medicine","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/UNCDeptMedicine","article_published_time":"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00","og_image":[{"width":237,"height":290,"url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Kim Morris","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@uncdeptmedicine","twitter_site":"@uncdeptmedicine","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Kim Morris"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/"},"author":{"name":"Kim Morris","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529"},"headline":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says","datePublished":"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00","dateModified":"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/"},"wordCount":92,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","keywords":["2021"],"articleSection":["Infectious Diseases","News"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/","url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/","name":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says | Department of Medicine","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","datePublished":"2021-01-16T03:26:24+00:00","dateModified":"2023-06-06T22:05:10+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","width":237,"height":290,"caption":"Emily Sickbert-Bennett, PhD, MS"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/disinfecting-surfaces-to-prevent-covid-19-may-be-overkill-expert-says\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Disinfecting Surfaces to Prevent COVID-19 May Be overkill, Expert Says"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/","name":"Department of Medicine","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/9a358414a53d5237f9ba3f8daa55c529","name":"Kim Morris","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/95c34b3e4d55a602b94260bccc6350c2ddfdde901530a734fe6c8fa9e3a5d399?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/95c34b3e4d55a602b94260bccc6350c2ddfdde901530a734fe6c8fa9e3a5d399?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Kim Morris"},"description":"Medicine - Dept of","url":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/author\/kcmorris\/"}]}},"featured_image":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","featured_image_medium":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-214x300.jpg","featured_image_medium_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","featured_image_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278.jpg","featured_image_thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/945\/2018\/12\/emily-bennett-e1595512367278-150x150.jpg","featured_image_alt":"emily-sickbert-bennett-dom-newsworthy-January-2022","category_details":[{"name":"Infectious Diseases","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/category\/infectious-diseases\/"},{"name":"News","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/category\/news\/"}],"tag_details":[{"name":"2021","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/news\/tag\/2021\/"}],"_links_to":[],"_links_to_target":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/69419"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}