How to Properly Clean and Disinfect Your Home During Flu Season

As the flu season approaches, the dreaded thought of catching the common cold becomes a reality. That’s why taking the necessary precautions for health, allergens, and indoor air quality is vital to keep yourself and your loved ones healthy. One of the most effective ways to do this is by cleaning and disinfecting your home properly and thoroughly. 

However, not all cleaning and disinfecting methods are created equal. In this blog post, we’ll share some cleaning tips and steps on how to properly clean and disinfect your home during flu season. At SweepSouth, we ensure that these best practices are included and encouraged during all bookings. 

5 Steps to Properly Clean and Disinfect Your Home

It’s understandable that keeping a clean and organised home often doesn’t feel worth the effort, especially while worrying about everything else in your life. The truth is, there’s so much to be gained from it, especially during flu season. Let’s take a look at the helpful steps that you can use when cleaning and disinfecting:

1. Create a Cleaning Plan
2. Clean Thoroughly
3. Disinfect Effectively
4. Practice Good Hygiene
5. Stay Vigilant

1. Create a Cleaning Plan

A well-thought-out cleaning plan will not only make your life easier but ensure that all areas of your home are cleaned and disinfected properly. If cleaning makes you feel overwhelmed, this is an essential step to ease your anxiety. As simple as it sounds, writing everything down or typing it out will ensure no cleaning task or area gets missed. Here are some useful tips to keep in mind when creating a cleaning plan:

• Identify high-traffic areas – These areas are more likely to harbour germs and viruses and should therefore be cleaned more regularly.
• Create a schedule that fits your lifestyle – Considering the above areas and your free time, create a schedule that works for you. For example, you may want to clean the bathroom twice a week, the kitchen every day, and the living room every second day. Be sure to allocate time to every little task so that you know how long it will take. 
• Gather the necessary supplies – Having all the essential cleaning tools and supplies will make the process much more efficient and effective. 
• Break down tasks – Dividing the cleaning tasks into smaller ones will help you manage them better. For example, under ‘cleaning the kitchen’ should be a list of smaller tasks such as ‘wipe countertops,’ ‘clean the sink,’ etc., with a time frame allocated to each task.
• Prioritise high-touch surfaces – Doorknobs, light switches, and remote controls are examples of high-touch surfaces that should be prioritised to eradicate all germs and viruses.

2. Clean Thoroughly

Cleaning before disinfecting is an important part of the entire process because contaminants such as dirt and grime harbour and shield viruses, preventing them from being killed. Thorough cleaning will remove these elements, allowing the disinfecting process to achieve the desired goal. Here are 5 cleaning tips to use when ensuring a thorough clean:

1. Use the right, eco-friendly products: While green cleaning is important for your and your family’s health, as well as the sake of the planet, using products with powerful germ-killing ingredients is vital. Check reviews and ask around to get the best opinion.
2. Clean from top to bottom: Do this to prevent dust and debris from falling onto surfaces that have already been cleaned.
3. Use hot water: For surfaces such as floors and countertops, hot water will help break down dirt and grime while also killing germs and viruses.
4. Disinfect sponges and cloths: These cleaning tools can also hold onto germs and viruses if they aren’t disinfected regularly. 
5. Change cleaning tools regularly: Once your cleaning tools begin to wear down, they should be replaced. Otherwise, they won’t do an effective job and will leave germs to spread. 

3. Disinfect Effectively

Disinfecting effectively is important because the flu virus can survive on surfaces for several hours, sometimes even days, depending on the type of surface and conditions surrounding it. When going through the process, be sure to focus on frequently touched surfaces. Make sure you also follow the manufacturer’s instructions on your disinfecting product for proper use and contact time to ensure effective disinfection. Here are some other disinfecting tips you can use for a thorough job:

• Wear gloves when disinfecting to avoid making skin contact with contaminated surfaces.
• Use hot water to launder bedding, towels, and other linens.
• Don’t use the same cleaning tools in different areas of your home. Allocate specific tools to each area.
• Allow surfaces time to dry after being disinfected to kill off any remaining germs.

4. Practice Good Hygiene

What many people fail to remember is the importance of good hygiene practices in between cleaning. Here are 4 hygiene tips to keep in mind when the flu season rolls around:

1. Wash your hands frequently with soap and water for at least 20 seconds.
2. Cover your nose and mouth when sneezing or coughing.
3. Wherever possible, avoid close contact with people who are sick.
4. Do a quick clean of commonly touched surfaces and objects in your home after you’ve had visitors.

5. Stay Vigilant

When in the thick of the flu season, staying vigilant of what’s going on around you can help decrease your chances of getting the flu. Look out for symptoms in yourself and others, find out about any crucial flu updates online, and increase your home cleaning frequency according to Winter activities and gatherings you have. 

Conclusion  

Keeping all of the above in mind, you’ll be able to properly clean and disinfect your home during flu season, so that you and your family remain healthy. The final tip we have is to book a recurring SweepSouth cleaning service with your SweepStar of choice. The meticulous cleaning they perform is guaranteed to keep your home spotless and germ-free.