David Cooper

Do we need that stuff in our everyday life?

Or is regular old soap fine?

So what happens with these compounds?

I'm looking at one here and the chemical name is hard for me to read.

Benzaclonium chloride.

Imagine I spray my kitchen sink with that.

Fine, the bacteria in it sort of die.

But then the ones that don't, do they somehow get stronger over time?

Here's the scary part for me.

This concept of cross-resistance, that some bacteria that could be harmful gets exposed to a disinfectant, even though it's not an antibiotic, and then somehow becomes resistant to antibiotics.

How is that possible?

Got it.

So you might hear something online like an influencer promoting some super antibacterial soap or something.

People get their information from wild sources today.

What's the bottom line with introducing these chemicals into your house and society using these chemicals a lot?

Do you think the pandemic and COVID has left us a little wackadoodle when it comes to using these chemicals in an attempt to sanitize surfaces where they don't need to be sanitized?

Okay, well, I got that.

And Miriam, you somehow made chemistry very fun.

I appreciate you coming on the show, talking about your research and discussing this information with me.

Professor Miriam Diamond is an environmental chemist at the University of Toronto.