NEW YORK—Are the world’s financial currencies and plastic cards helping to spread the coronavirus?
"Cash is not a good vehicle to transport respiratory viruses. However, cards have a little bit more potential," Dr. Susan Whittier, a clinical microbiologist at New York-Presbyterian Hospital at Columbia University Medical Center, told USA Today. "If someone is coughing and then they hand their credit card to someone across the counter, I wouldn’t rule out the potential of transmission."
Viruses, in general, tend to survive longer on hard surfaces like credit cards and coins than they do on porous surfaces like fabric and dollar bills, Whittier added.
Chinese banks have already started essentially washing money to destroy potentially infected cash before it's handed back out, USA Today noted.
"Cash received by banks must be sterilized before being released to customers," the Chinese government's website recently announced. The nation is using ultraviolet light and heat to kill any bacteria on the surface of currency, USA Today said.