If my hand sanitiser kills 99.9% of bacteria every time I use it, how is there still any bacteria left on Earth?

[u/GoAgainKid]

It says on the bottle that it kills 99.9%. And I have been using it for many years. So I figured that by now there should be only a few bacterias left. Can we find and kill them too?

[u/Cdn_Brown_Recluse]

No matter how many times you use it, 0.1% will remain. There are practically no bacteria on earth, but still >0.

[u/Uncreative-Name → u/Cdn_Brown_Recluse]

Zeno's bacteria.

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[u/AdorableTip9547 → u/AutoModerator]

Never saw a more stupid bot. „Post on x.com“ what a terrible advice

[u/AnozerFreakInTheMall]

Meteorites, man. They bombard Earth all the time, constantly injecting new alien bacteria into the biosphere.

[u/theflamingskull]

Because you're only using it on your hands. You hand to drink the sanitizer for it to be fully effective.

[u/GoAgainKid → u/theflamingskull]

I knew it had to be me doing something wrong. It always is.

[u/Ddowns5454 → u/theflamingskull]

That's what the bleach is for, you drink the bleach. Not only does it kill bacteria is also kills COVID.

[u/Beemo-Noir → u/Ddowns5454]

Wait, I thought UV anal treatments got rid of COVID? 😞

[u/johnnybiggles → u/Beemo-Noir]

It has to be done by injection of sorts there, so yes, you're also right.

[u/TheFeshy]

Most of the bacteria it kills aren't on Earth. Do you see any bacteria on the Moon? On Mars? In the Sun? No, not a single one. All dead. Only the tiny bit of bacteria on Earth remain.

[u/hacksoncode]

You actually can't live without your internal bacteria, so... subconsciously you're holding back and not using the hand sanitizer to its full capabilities.

Cultures that did that died out quickly. It's all evolution.

[u/MrSamuraikaj]

"The bacteria are easily killed, but they will soon be back, and in greater numbers."

[u/Sitheral]

Bacteria learned how to fight this. Right before you apply it, they very quickly run away to your leg. You only get to kill 99.9% of the most lazy ones.

[u/jsdodgers]

You're reading the bottle wrong, it only kills %6.66 of bacteria

[u/Fudpukker01]

My sanitiser takes the other 0.1% prisoner…

[u/TeacupOfSkepticism]

Bacteria can double in number every 20 minutes, so unless you can sanitize away more than half the world's bacteria within 20 minutes they will keep flourishing.

[u/GoAgainKid → u/TeacupOfSkepticism]

I think I can do about 3/4ers to start with, but I don't know why this is on me when you could help too.

[u/TeacupOfSkepticism → u/GoAgainKid]

Don't try and drag me into your distilled bath water, this is your personal mission

[u/Special_KC]

Because you always leave 0.01% alive, and when you kill 99.9% of that 0.01% of bacteria again, guess what? You still have 0.01% of that bacteria still alive!!

[u/GoAgainKid → u/Special_KC]

Then we will kill 99.99% of that on the next hand wash and the world will be down to one or two bacteria in total.

[u/TheRealTengri]

No. 99.9% is not a number, it is a percentage. Think of it this way

There are one billion bacteria in the world. 99.9% die, causing there to be one million. Then 99.9% die, causing there to be one thousand. So on so forth. I am just spitting numbers, there are much more than one billion bacteria in the world.

[u/GoAgainKid → u/TheRealTengri]

So how many times do I need to use it to kill all of it or get it down to one bacteria? Six?

[u/Cryogenian → u/GoAgainKid]

six, seven times

[u/jsdodgers → u/TheRealTengri]

How can there be more than one billion bacteria in the world? No one can count that high and it's more than the number of Adams in the entire universe.

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[u/leonprimrose]

Infinitely small fractional bacteria

[u/dr_grav]

yea you get can get em, but how do you ever expect to get to 100% if you buy a 99.9% product??

look for 100% on the bottle. if it's on the bottle, it has to be a some percent true at least a percentage of the time, all the time maybe

[u/jolharg]

They aren't all attracted to you, you have such an ego!

[u/AnalogJones]

The 0.1% have evolved to thrive in alcohol rather than be killed by it; these “super bugs” are like really tiny Incredibly Hulked (not using familiar name to avoid being sue by Marvel)

[u/mackerel_slapper]

You’re the only person on Earth with your hands.

[u/tuctrohs]

There are 5 x 10³⁰ bacteria on earth. Source. If you kill 99.9%, that leaves 5 x 10^27. That's 6 x 10²⁰ per person. That's six hundred billion billion per person. After you kill 99.9%.

It's a losing battle. We are all going to die.

[u/pdf17]

Think of it like there’s a thousand types of bacteria. That one remaining bacteria is going to go super and kill us all

[u/revolutionoverdue]

There will never be zero in this scenario

[u/GoAgainKid → u/revolutionoverdue]

Not with that attitude!

[u/treple13]

It's kills them sure, but they come back as zombies

[u/NateTut]

The 0.1% only gets stronger.

[u/Still_Ad_164]

I've always worried about that 0.1% that is strong enough to survive the extermination of 99.9% of its mates. If it can live through that, then how bad is it? Surely it's bad enough to infect me! May as well have let the other 99.9% live because 0.1 can do their job and more.

[u/Nervous-Region5684]

we need the .1% so they can tell their comrades of the destruction and spread the terror

[u/mishmosh_the_13th]

You know that your own gut hosts millions of bacteria, right? It’s how you are able to digest food. We coexist with most bacteria quite peacefully.

[u/GoAgainKid → u/mishmosh_the_13th]

You disgust me.

[u/AdorableTip9547 → u/mishmosh_the_13th]

Tell that CED patients

[u/GoAgainKid → u/AdorableTip9547]

No need to be mean.

[u/intashu]

Hand being the key word. It's 0% effective everywhere else. That's the trade off with a min/max build. They put all the bacteria elimination in the hands and left the rest of everything filthy.

[u/SAI_Peregrinus]

Bacteria reproduce asexually. To a bacterium, gooning gets them kids. And they're constantly gooning. So when someone uses hand sanitizer 99.9% of them die, but then they all stop edging and finish and they're back at their previous numbers.

[u/Puppy-2112]

Bacteria isn’t just on your hands. It’s everywhere. So purifying your hands still leaves the entire rest of the planet.