Abstract

THE NOVEL USE OF ANTIBACTERIAL ACTIVITY OF SOME COMMON AGENTS TO DECREASE BACTERIAL POPULATION FROM THE SURFACE OF INDIAN CURRENCY NOTE

Sweta Manna, Soumen Roy Chowdhury, Arijit Pani, Sayak Nanda, Bharathi S Sayak and Satadal Das*

ABSTRACT

Money is not everything, but money is something very important. Beyond the basic needs, money helps us achieve our life’s goals and supports the things we care about most deeply-family, education health care, charity, adventure and fun. Paper currency is repeatedly used in exchange for goods and service and in this way of the circulation of paper currency from one individual to another help spread of potentially harmful microorganisms. Different paper currency note samples were collected from vegetable vendors, fruit vendors, fish vendors, provisional shops and sweet shops in Batanagar Nangi bazaar area, kolkata. The samples analyzed for their resident microorganisms. Both gram positive and gram negative bacteria were found on currency notes. Predominant bacteria found on currency notes were Staphylococcus, Bacillus, Micrococcus, Serratia etc. The sensitivity tests were performed to detect sensitivity pattern of isolated organisms against standard antibiotic discs. Thus Paper currency commonly contaminated with microbes and in this way they may play a role in transmission of potentially harmful organisms. So cash should not be handled by children and should be kept away from food and cosmetics. We may use naphthalene, or a small piece of “odonil”, or few tobacco leaves on one side where we keep the notes without touching them directly so that all these microorganisms including any pathogenic one will be inhibited by them.

Keywords: Currency notes, Bacteria, antibacterial agents.