When the team at the Oxford English Dictionary looked back on 2020, they decided that the year had been too momentous to just have one Word Of The Year like every other year. It needed a whole list of words because these are Unprecedented Times (although ironically ‘unprecedented’ didn’t make the list).
Of course most of the words related to the pandemic – social distancing, lockdown, COVID-19, coronavirus. And who had even heard of someone being furloughed before March this year?
One word that didn’t make the list, and perhaps should have is antimicrobial – something that is active against microbes. An antimicrobial “is an agent that kills microorganisms or stops their growth”. That certainly sounds like something we all need right now!
Here at Hodgson Sealants hygiene properties are something that we have taken very seriously for a long time. It’s not a pleasant thought but microbes tend to thrive most in corner joints, cracks and crevices which is often where you will find sealants. That’s why using an antimicrobial sealant is becoming increasingly common in many hygiene sensitive settings like food prep, kitchens, healthcare settings, schools, care homes and bathrooms – anywhere where hygiene is paramount.
We teamed up with the experts in antimicrobial technology, BioCote® to produce a range of sealants that could be used in these settings and offer a proven ability to reduce bacteria by up to 99.9%. The results were our HY-SPEC Hygieneseal and the HY-SPEC Ag sealants, two new generation hybrid sealants that contain BioCote® Silver Ion technology.
Silver has been known to have antimicrobial properties for centuries and was used to control infection in ancient civilisations. BioCote® has harnessed this property into its antimicrobial additives which are in our sealants to produce HY-SPEC Hygieneseal and the HY-SPEC Ag (which has additional anti-pick properties making it perfect for prisons, schools and other public facing applications).
So how do the silver ions work against microbes? Well here’s the science bit! It works in three ways:
Damage: they promote the formation of reactive oxygen species which irreversibly damages bacteria cells
Stop: they stop bacteria reproduction by interfering with their DNA replication and regeneration
Disrupt: they are able to combine with bacteria proteins to disrupt in energy production and other essential functions that keep bacteria alive.
Essentially though, anyone using Hodgson HY-SPEC Hygieneseal and HY-SPEC Ag doesn’t need to know that. The products act, gun and tool just the same as our standard products. They have the same excellent performance characteristics. But with the added reassurance of BioCote®’s independent testing to ensure their continued effectiveness in reducing levels of harmful bacteria, mould and viruses by up to 99.99%.
If you’d like to know more about our antimicrobial sealants you can visit our web site:
HY-SPEC Hygieneseal: https://hodgsonsealants.com/product/hygieneseal-ag/
As for what the word of 2021 might be, we are going for “thank goodness that’s over!”
