Health
Copper Destroys Viruses and Bacteria. Why Isn’t It Everywhere? It could destroy norovirus, MRSA, virulent strains of E. coli, and coronaviruses—including the novel strain currently causing the COVID-19 pandemic. In 1852, physician Victor Burq visited a copper smelter in Paris's 3rd arrondissement, where they used heat and chemicals to extract the reddish-brown metal. It was a dirty and dangerous job. Burq found the facility to be "in poor condition," along with the housing and the hygiene of the smelters. Normally, their mortality rates were "pitiful," he observed. Yet, the 200 employees who worked there had all been spared from cholera outbreaks that hit the city in 1832, 1849, and 1852. When Burq learned that 400 to 500 copper workers on...