Daijiworld Media Network - Dubai (SHP)
Dubai, May 19: As a preventive measure for the spread of the COVID-19, a senior Dubai cop has urged people to disinfect their mobile phones.
"There are hundreds and hundreds of microbes on your mobile phone. You could be carrying the enemy with you without knowing it," Major Dr Rashid Al Ghafri, director of Training and Development at the General Department of Forensic Sciences and Criminology at Dubai Police, was quoted in a report by the Khaleej Times.
Al Ghafri was part of a research collaboration between the Dubai Police and Bonn And Murdoch University in Australia that found that microphones were highly likely to transmit microbes, including coronavirus.
"We took 24 mobile phones as samples and our research found infectious pathogens, such as bacteria and viruses like COVID-19, on them. And when you touch the phone and touch your face again with the same hands, you are at risk of getting infected," he added.
"There are some studies that say the virus cannot stay on the surface for too long. But our studies showed that microbes can stay for hours and reproduce on mobile phones," Al Ghafri said.
The research also stated that the heat generated when mobile phones are in use stimulates the microbes causing them to stay for longer and reproduce.
"Thus phones are likely to be the 'Trojan Horses' in spreading the virus," the officer pointed out.
"Mobile phones can be called as our third arm. It has become an extension of our hands. We are addicted to them. We keep them in our pocket. We take them to the toilet. And when we talk on the mobile phone, we deposit droplets that contain the virus," he asserted.
Al Ghafri said if people wash their hands and then touch their mobile phones, they are contaminating their hands again.
"If you ask me, I would say people should disinfect their mobile phones as often as they would wash their hands. If you touch your phone and touch your nose or face again, that will lead to secondary contamination," Al Ghafri stressed.
He also requested people to refrain themselves from using the mobile phones of another person, a step to be used as a precaution against the coronavirus.