Foaming soap
Foaming soap is all the rage these days. It’s kind of cool to pump fluffy bubbles onto your hands to wash them, and since most of us equate clean with bubbles, it certainly seems like you’re getting cleaner. As an added benefit, you can refill your foaming soap containers with a mixture of soap and water and save money on soap. Less soap is released into the water system. It’s all good.
But is foaming soap any better than normal soap?
I tend to think foaming soap is better. Afterall, all those bubbles have surfaces and the increased surface area of the cleaning reagent seems to me that it’s greatly increased. I have a friend who swears by foaming soap and regularly brings me new kinds to try.
Again, is foaming soap any better than normal soap?
I read Science News frequently. In fact, it’s probably my favorite magazine. The magazine recently featured a little article on hand washing. I don’t remember the actual numbers, but it was something like washing your hands with waterless cleaners remove 50% of the germs on your hands while washing with straight water removes 95% of the germs. Washing with soap and water removes 99% of the germs.
If foaming soap removes another 0.5% (WAG) of germs than normal soap, the incremental advantage doesn’t seem that great.
I am going to stick with foaming soap. The refill cost and the idea that less soap is going into the water system makes it worthwhile to me.
Labels: foam, soap, tensegrity