We all know we need to wash our hands to keep ourselves safe from germ exposure. But what else can be done to protect ourselves, our families and our neighbors from the spread of the Coronavirus?
Nick Aiello, of PuroClean of Mid-Michigan, is a leading expert in professional biohazard cleanup. He and his team work with homeowners and businesses of all sizes to help them keep their buildings clean and safe.
There are simple steps we can all take outside of our typical cleaning regime. These include making sure to wipe down all horizontal surfaces, being vigilant with cleaning doorknobs and to launder all clothing and bathing after being out in the public – before you sit on your own furniture.
“I think the most important thing during a time like this is people need to remember to stay calm,’’ he said. “People need to remember to be kind to one another and when it does come to cleaning, I think in a time like this, it’s most important to leave it to the professionals. So, if you are concerned, or if you are looking for peace of mind, please give us a call.’’
Learn more about how you can best prepare your home or business by watching this video or reading the transcript below.
PuroClean of Mid-Michigan – Coronavirus Cleanup Video Transcript:
Julie: Today at mConnexions, we are starting a series of Facebook lives right here on Facebook to address all of the changes and challenges and concerns surrounding coronavirus and COVID-19. If you are feeling the impact you are not alone. We are hearing from community members, our clients, our entire global community is feeling the impact of all of the changes being made here in the US due to coronavirus. And so today we’re gonna start by bringing on one of our clients that is really working hard to help businesses in the area. Nick Aiello of PuroClean of mid-Michigan joins me now. Nick thank you so much for taking the time today to talk to all of our viewers here on Facebook. I know you and your team are very busy right now.
Nick: Absolutely thanks for having us Julie.
Julie: Yeah I really appreciate you Nick coming on to share your expertise and to give us some peace of mind on the cleaning aspect of viruses. So Nick PuroClean of Mid-Michigan deals with biohazard cleanup, so this is something that your team is very familiar with and even though coronavirus is something new there are techniques and there are things that you are already aware of and employing with your clients. So I want to start there, Nick what are you and your team doing right now as it relates to coronavirus?
Nick: Sure so, over this past I’d say two weeks rolling into this upcoming week we’ve been meeting with a lot of our larger clients out there, larger buildings, schools specifically, especially with the new governor mandated shutdown of schools until the first week of April. And what we’ve been doing is just walking everyone through what we would call best practice. A couple of things that we’ve picked up through some of our connections out there, some top field biochemists and top field environmentalists that we’re working with, is that this virus is a bit unpredictable as far as how long it can live on surfaces. A couple things that we are working on is making sure that everyone is cleaning, specifically horizontal surfaces, so desks, tabletops, countertops, especially in high-traffic areas, so specifically –
Julie: Can you talk about that a little bit Nick. Why horizontal surfaces? What is it about horizontal services that we should focus on, so from everything that we’ve learned through our connections this virus specifically when it is brought into the air can rest and live longest upon horizontal surfaces. So what we’re less worried about are the walls, the doors, the windows, so on and so forth, but more the horizontal surfaces. So if someone were to sneeze someone were to cough, that’s where it’s going to rust the longest. And what we’ve learned the most about is stainless steel surfaces and plastic surfaces, specifically is where the virus can rest and lay dormant the longest.
Julie: Okay interesting, so talk to us a little bit about the products you use because I know this is very important talking about the products and especially because you and I were talking earlier and you focus on using non-toxic products, but this is something that you’ve seen that is already you know an issue for some businesses or schools even.
Nick: Absolutely, with the fear going on out there everyone is knee-jerk running out to the store and buying anything that is considered a cleaning product. Which is great in theory, but we’re most concerned about the products that we’re putting out there and how they affect people after the fact. Specifically, when you’re talking about something like a school or a place where children are gonna be hopefully returning to. We want to make sure that what we’re using to clean is also non-toxic, non-hazardous to the environment that we’re putting it into. So we’re focusing on using a nontoxic pesticide that is that is EPA approved and the disinfectant that we’re using is so clean that you could actually drink it, it would be a non-factor to your body.
Julie: Okay wow okay really interesting right and I know that stores certainly around here have sold out like you said of all of those cleaning products, but many of them are toxic. We don’t want to trade one problem for another, so really good to hear that you’re talking about that and Nick also I know your products are all EPA approved, safe products can you talk about that at all?
Nick: Yeah so we get we guidelines not only from our parent company PuroClean, the larger company corporate, but we’ve been taking a lot of insight from our environmentalist contacts as well as our biochemist contacts and our goal is to ensure that everything that we use is non-hazardous to animals to humans that encounter the space that we’ve cleaned after the fact.
Julie: Okay really important to know, thank you Nick for that. So what are some best practices you can share for those of us at home that are kind of self-isolating as we practice this social distancing? What are some best practices in our own homes that you can talk about?
Nick: I mean sure I mean we’ve heard it now I feel a nauseam you know the idea of watching our hands and the idea that we possibly weren’t washing our hands beforehand is kind of kind of ironic but yeah wash your hands after touching anything doorknobs especially, I mean you think about how many people encounter a doorknob throughout the day. Cleaning our surfaces after we eat, after we cook something, after we prepare a meal in the kitchen. One thing that I’m practicing, I’m having my family practice as well is after we go out we change our clothes when we get home, so the idea that you know you go out you encounter people at a store at a business wherever you know you put on a clean set of clothes before you go sit down on your couch, you sit down on your bed, you do anything like that, and you make sure everything gets good to wash properly. So I think that’s one thing that we’ve kind of missed in the news and everything else, but yes the idea of washing your hands after you use the restroom, after you after you prepare a meal, I mean that’s something we should be doing pandemic or not right.
Julie: Right absolutely and even you know yesterday I was getting the mail and I was thinking okay you come inside you wash your hands. You know any kind of contact outside of your home outside of your own surroundings and just making sure that you’re keeping up with that for sure and that’s a great idea Nick. I hadn’t thought of, you know, coming home showering, washing your clothes, kind of getting rid of anything that might have been in contact with any contaminants. Really probably best practices any time. Which is something I know that there’s been a lot of talk about we’re just not used to here in our country. We haven’t seen you know something like this before so it’s certainly new for all of us. What are some of the businesses that you’re working with? I know part of what your team does is working on planning in advance, so kind of that proactive approach but also now with the spread of COVID-19 going in and doing the cleanup. So what are some businesses that should really be taking note perhaps of using professional services instead of their own employees or their own over-the-counter products?
Nick: Sure, the businesses we’re focusing on right now this week are what we would call high-traffic businesses. I mean we’ve seen it all over the news, the grocery stores the amount of people that are entering the grocery store preparing for this pandemic and preparing for the fact that they might be stuck at home for a couple weeks. You look at a place like that, I mean that’s got to be a hotbed for spreading this virus and how quickly can a business that stays open for 24 hours clean and disinfect their establishment properly. Another business where we’re looking at is the gyms are still open. You know most gyms I mean the gym that I go to regularly, they require that the people using the equipment clean the equipment themselves. You know, with a Lysol rag or a spray or something like that. Which is great in theory, but they should be looking into a service like ours where we can provide a deep cleaning you know maybe at night when there’s far less traffic or I know a lot of businesses that are 24 hours right now are considering closing down for a three to six-hour period in the middle of the night for cleaning. That’s where a company like us could step in and ensure that everything is cleaned from head to toe properly and safely. Churches, banks, those are those are other businesses that we’re looking at. I mean even in time like this people still need to go into their banks and be able to exchange money and cash paychecks and so on and so forth and you think of something like that the number of hands that that currency you know changes through and so on and so forth. So high-traffic areas are really our focus right now.
Julie: Okay so in certainly schools I know you’re working with a lot of schools in the area for kind of preventive planning and now that kids of course are out of school and in the short term here going in and doing cleanup before they return, so all of that is really good to know. So you work with – do you work with businesses of all sizes Nick? Are you looking at just large corporations or small businesses as well? What’s your focus there?
Nick: We can do businesses of all sizes. I mean we historically we’ve done businesses as small as a singular office – we’ve done entire office structures with you know 20-30 suites. We’ve worked with a couple school districts thus far. What we’re doing as far as these larger scale clients, like a school district is we’re preparing what’s called a disaster relief plan and what we’re able to do is we can come in and we can do a three-dimensional rendering of the entire building which is pretty cool. If you’ve ever visited a real estate website, where they can do a virtual walkthrough of a home. Yeah absolutely and that’s what we can do with these large-scale buildings. So when you’re when you’re talking about a building that could be you know north of 200,000 square feet, we have we have a three-dimensional rendering which allows us to know where every HVAC system is, where every nook and cranny is, to ensure that everything is covered everything is cleaned and nothing’s missed. That’s a service that we’re offering to clients right now free of charge. As long as they sit down for a consultation with us.
Julie: Okay Nick what’s the best way to get a hold of you? To learn more – you know to schedule a service like that?
Nick: So our website is always great I believe you’re attaching a link to the website – in the yep good plan we’ll put that right in this live. We have what we have a 24-hour line which is (517) 292 – 8700 and we can be reached at that number at any hour.
Julie: Excellent Nick thank you so much for taking time today. Is there anything else that you want to add that that we haven’t covered that’s top of mind? I know you and your team are kind of on the front line so to speak of going out there and cleaning spaces, so thank you for the work that you do, but is there anything else that we haven’t covered that you want to mention?
Nick: I think the most important thing is during a time like this people need to remember to stay calm. People need to remember to be kind to one another and when it does come to cleaning I think in the time like this its most important to leave it to the professionals. So if you are concerned or if you’re just looking for peace of mind, please give us a call.
Julie: Absolutely Nick thank you so much and we’ll also put a link to PuroClean of Mid-Michigan’s Facebook page. They are offering a lot of resources we’ve got over there a PDF, eight commonly asked questions about cleanup, and about the latest related to that and there’s a lot of information on PuroClean website, so we’ll again we’ll link that here on this live video so that those of you at home can take a look at that. So Nick Aiello of PuroClean of Mid-Michigan thank you so much for joining us.
Nick: Thank You Julie.
When your home or business has been damaged in a disaster, PuroClean of Howell is here for you when you need us, any time of day, any day of the week. When you contact us at (517) 292-8700 or stevescott@puroclean.com, we’ll get your property on the road to its pre-loss condition quickly, competently and compassionately—guaranteed.
