Lately our hands are living some hard times with all that necessary extra hand washing and sanitizing. The desinfection isn’t exactly good for the skin, however, it’s a necessary measure in moments when you cannot wash your hands. This is a caring hand sanitizer with aloe vera that sanitizes and soothes.
This gel is very gentle to the skin, it doesn’t contain any alcohol. Therefore, it’s not as potent as this hand sanitizer with aloe vera but it comes handy in moments when you want a protection agains less serious things than COVID-19. If you want something more potent, try the above mentioned sanitizer or the hand sanitizer usually used in hospitals.
As the name tells you, you’ll need the aloe vera gel. If you have this plant at home, you can harvest the gel yourself, here’s how to do it. Besides the aloe vera gel I used also an essential oil with desinfecting effects.
Table of Contents
Supplies for the caring hand sanitizer with aloe vera
- 100 g of aloe vera gel
- 25 g of glycerin
- 10 drops of tea tree essential oil
- 10 drops of grapefruit essential oil (or other)
- potassium sorbate: 1,5 g of 20% solution or 0,3 g of granules
- bottle with dispenser
The aloe vera gel and the glycerin soothe the skin. Moreover, aloe vera fights the bacteria, virus and fungae. The tea tree oil is anti-bacterial and anti-septic and I add the grapefruit essential oil or other because I don’t like the smell of tea tree. The potassium sorbate is a preservative that we need to add because the aloe vera gel contains water and without a preservative the product will grow fungae and other unwanted things within two days.
How to make it
Blend the aloe vera gel completely smooth and mix in the potassium sorbate and let it dissolve. Then add glycerin and the essential oils. Pour the sanitizer into the bottle and use as needed.
Why is the gel in the photos pink?
That’s because of the grapefruit essential oil which is of pink color. If you add clear oil your hand sanitizer will be clear.
Don’t forget!
The hand sanitizer should be used only when you cannot wash your hands. The best way to prevent transferring coronavirus (or other viruses and bacteria) is washing your hands often and in the correct way. You can watch this video to see how it’s done correctly. And here’s a UNICEF document on handwashing.
Also don’t forget that it’s important to have your nails cut short and if you have to ho out (by tram or bus, to the post office and so on), use gloves that you can sterilize or use single-use gloves.
Still don’t have a face mask?
Here are some tutorials:
