Development and virucidal activity of a novel alcohol-based hand disinfectant supplemented with urea and citric acid.

Georgios Ionidis,Jochen Steinmann,Eike Steinmann,Veronika Hodasa,Florian H H Brill,Thomas Jack,Daniel Todt,Judith Hübscher,Britta Becker,Birte Bischoff

doi:10.1186/s12879-016-1410-9

Abstract

BackgroundHand disinfectants are important for the prevention of virus transmission in the health care system and environment. The development of broad antiviral spectrum hand disinfectants with activity against enveloped and non-enveloped viruses is limited due to a small number of permissible active ingredients able to inactivate viruses.MethodsA new hand disinfectant was developed based upon 69.39 % w/w ethanol and 3.69 % w/w 2-propanol. Different amounts of citric acid and urea were added in order to create a virucidal claim against poliovirus (PV), adenovirus type 5 (AdV) and polyomavirus SV40 (SV40) as non-enveloped test viruses in the presence of fetal calf serum (FCS) as soil load. The exposure time was fixed to 60 s.ResultsWith the addition of 2.0 % citric acid and 2.0 % urea an activity against the three test viruses was achieved demonstrating a four log10 reduction of viral titers. Furthermore, this formulation was able to inactivate PV, AdV, SV40 and murine norovirus (MNV) in quantitative suspension assays according to German and European Guidelines within 60 s creating a virucidal claim. For inactivation of vaccinia virus and bovine viral diarrhea virus 15 s exposure time were needed to demonstrate a 4 log10 reduction resulting in a claim against enveloped viruses. Additionally, it is the first hand disinfectant passing a carrier test with AdV and MNV.ConclusionsIn conclusion, this new formulation with a low alcohol content, citric acid and urea is capable of inactivating all enveloped and non-enveloped viruses as indicated in current guidelines and thereby contributing as valuable addition to the hand disinfection portfolio.

Highlights

Hand disinfectants are important for the prevention of virus transmission in the health care system and environment
Hand antiseptics can be tested on artificially contaminated hands or fingerpads with test viruses such as adenovirus type 5 (AdV), rhinovirus type 14 or 37, human rotavirus, surrogates of human norovirus like murine norovirus (MNV) or feline calicivirus (FCV) and hepatitis A virus (HAV) [17,18,19]
We present a novel alcohol-based hand rubs (ABHRs) based on ethanol, supplemented with variable amounts of citric acid and urea additives that fulfils DVV/Robert Koch-Institute (RKI) Guideline and EN 14476 for virucidal activity in quantitative suspension tests

Summary

Introduction

Hand disinfectants are important for the prevention of virus transmission in the health care system and environment. The development of broad antiviral spectrum hand disinfectants with activity against enveloped and non-enveloped viruses is limited due to a small number of permissible active ingredients able to inactivate viruses. A disinfectant for hand hygiene would ideally possess broad antiviral spectrum covering nonenveloped in addition to enveloped viruses offering increased protection against persistent, unexpected or unknown viruses [12, 13]. Disinfectants inactivating poliovirus (PV), AdV and polyomavirus SV40 (SV40) and since 2015 MNV can claim activity against all viruses (virucidal) according DVV/RKI Guideline [22]. In 2012, an additional DVV Guideline for testing the antiviral activity of disinfectants on stainless steel disks carriers simulating practical situations was established [26] and the discrimination limited spectrum virucidal / virucidal claim exists there as well (Table 1). Work is in progress to develop a EN Norm for the virucidal carrier test testing MNV and AdV as test viruses [27]

Methods

Results

Conclusion