Astral Hygiene

  What Is BS EN 1276? Why It Matters for Cleaning and Disinfection  27th June 2025  | By Yewan Armstrong   |  Cleaning Tips ,  Environmental Health ,  Hygiene ,  Sustainability ,  Coronovirus When it comes to cleaning and disinfection, not all products are created equal. In environments where hygiene is critical—like food preparation areas, hospitals, schools, and public spaces—it’s essential to use disinfectants that are proven to work. That’s where BS EN 1276 comes in. This recognised European standard certifies that a product can kill 99.999% of harmful bacteria within minutes. In this post, we’ll explain what BS EN 1276 means, why it matters, and how to ensure the products you’re using meet this important benchmark. What Is BS EN 1276? Why It Matters for Cleaning and Disinfection When choosing cleaning products—especially in commercial, healthcare, or food environments—it’s vital to understand the standards that ensure safety and effectiv...

  Part 2 - Environmental Health - Are you doing it right?  23rd May 2024  | By Anna Armstrong   |  Environmental Health To follow on from what we learned about visits from your Environmental Health Officer; how they are not the mortal enemy, more a source of knowledge and experience to make sure you are maintaining your hygiene by taking the right approach; we will be talking about how your EHO wants you to wash your dishes. The last time I blogged about the benefits of a colour coding system, and how having all areas assigned a colour ensures  clarity in terms of which mop is to be used where just makes maintaining hygiene standards a lot easier.  Just recapping really quickly these are the colours and the zones which they should be attributed to.   This blog is about an equally important and quite a contentious issue how to wash your dishes the correct way (yes there is a correct way)!  Simple right? Well no it’s not really that simple so p...

  Monkeypox Virus  2nd June 2022  | By Anna Armstrong   |  Cleaning Tips ,  Environmental Health ,  Hygiene ,  Sustainability ,  Coronovirus Transmission Transmission Spread of Monkeypox may occur when a person comes into close contact with an infected human or animal, or materials contaminated with the virus. Monkeypox has not been detected in animals in the UK. The virus can enter the body through broken skin, the respiratory tract, or the mucous membranes (eyes, nose, or mouth). Person-to-person spread is uncommon, but may occur through: direct contact with Monkeypox skin lesions or scabs coughing or sneezing of an individual with a Monkeypox rash contact with clothing or linens (such as bedding or towels) used by an infected person The risk of transmission can be substantially reduced by cleaning and disinfection, or by washing clothes or domestic equipment with standard detergents and cleaning products. In the home transmission can be re...

  Ways to prepare your workplace for winter.....  13th January 2022  | By Anna Armstrong   |  Cleaning Tips ,  Environmental Health ,  Hygiene ,  Sustainability ,  Coronovirus It’s that time of year again. The days are shortening, temperatures are dropping, and snow is knocking at the door in many parts of the country. But this winter season will be unlike any we’ve seen before. With the COVID-19 pandemic altering how we work, convene, and communicate, it will be more important than ever to ensure your workplace is prepared for the cold months ahead. This winter season will bring new challenges for which businesses everywhere must be ready. Over the last several months, we have seen a massive shift toward remote work. Under stay-at-home orders and social distancing guidelines, teleworking has become the new norm. Most of us underestimate how cold the UK can get in the depths of winter, and we often neglect the small steps that make winters sa...

  Guide to buying paper towels  4th October 2021  | By Anna Armstrong What should I consider when choosing my paper towel? Paper towels, or hand towels are a huge part of our society, and are used by a mulititde of people for many differing reasons. They can be used for drying hands, mopping up spills, and everyday cleaning.  In todays' blog, we'll examine everything you should be looking at and evaluating, when considering which type of hand towel is for you.   Many people think that price is the most important factor, and it is important, but you also need to think about what impression do you want to make; how many towels are in a case (because a case of towels at £20 for 1200 towels is VERY different than for a case of towels at £20 for 5000 towels).   Other areas for consideration would be how many ply, sheet size, absorbancy, fold or roll, centrefeed or handtowel roll?  See what I mean? Something so simple like choosing a handtowel is a...

  Cross Contamination ... how to avoid it!  15th October 2021  | By Anna Armstrong What is cross contamination? Making a kitchen look clean by removal of crumbs and smears is easy, but this does not  mean that your kitchen is not contaminated by life threatening bacteria like E-coli and MRSA.  So how clean is your kitchen, is it tidy but contaminated with bacteria?   Cross contamination is the easiest and most common way in which people get food poisoning. Cross contamination is effectively bacteria being put on to surfaces, and being picked up and contaminating food.  If a piece of equipment isn't handled correctly, cross contamination can easily occur, and can infect food and can make customers very unwell.  If you are not educated enough and aren't making enough of an effort to avoid cross contamination E.Coli can spread, grow and multiply and this is one of the most deadly bacteria you can find in your kitchen. The spread of E.Coli can no...

  How does Antimicrobial Resistance affect us?  28th October 2021  | By Anna Armstrong Antimicrobial Resistance is the ability of bacteria and viruses to develop a resistance to the things we use to treat them. These pathogens are living organisms, and it's natural for them to mutate to their surroundings in order to survive.  These mutations enable the pathogen to resist antibiotics and cleaning prodcuts that would have previously eradicated them. This issue has wider implications for both the cleaning and the healthcare sector. Although antibiotics are continually updated and reworked to tackle the new mutations the pathogens present, it is still and ongoing challenge for our healthcare professionals to combat.  We are regularly facing patients who have contagious pathogens with no known cure, such as COVID 19 which we as a global presence recently and are continuing to face.   Although antimicrobial resistance will occur naturally over time, just as...