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- Title
Hygiene issues in domestic laundry care practices.
- Authors
Gupta, Nidhi; Sekhri, Seema
- Abstract
Laundry hygiene is often a forgotten area of household hygiene because, by its very nature, laundry areas and washed garments are perceived as clean. In general, visual assessment of a garment is used to assess the quality of cleaning processes and any garment free from soil and stains are perceived as clean. However, it is important to realise that any garment which appears to be physically clean may not be hygienically clean. Garments and household linens are often found to be contaminated with infectious micro-organisms which are not visible to naked eye and thus, may serve as a potential source of spread of infections in a household setting. Ensuring hygiene during domestic laundry is very important as microbial and fungal transfer can occur between infected and non-infected clothing during washing. Research studies have found viable micro-organisms on environmental surfaces, including washed and unwashed clothing, and places that come in contact with laundry like washing machines and so on. Under certain conditions, clothing contaminated with pathogenic organisms during laundry may present a health risk to the wearer and to the laundry handler. The present article is a comprehensive literature review of hygiene issues and risk of spread of infection through domestic laundry practices and how these can be minimised or reduced effectively to ensure hygiene of clothing and household linens during laundry.
- Subjects
HYGIENE; LAUNDRY; HOUSEKEEPING; CLOTHING &; dress; INFECTION; HOUSEHOLD linens
- Publication
International Journal of Home Economics, 2017, Vol 10, Issue 1, p50
- ISSN
1999-561X
- Publication type
Article