The widespread use of antibacterial hand wash and hand sanitisers, promoted as a prevention measure against COVID-19, will lead to a rise in superbugs that cause untreatable diseases, Australian biomedical experts warn. Researchers from Monash University are urging the public to stop using soaps labelled as “antibacterial” when washing hands because they could lead to antibacterial or anti-microbial resistant (AMR) bacteria. “If I wash my hands constantly with anti-bacterial or anti-microbial soaps, the microbes that live on my hands will be constantly barraged by anti-microbials, and they’ll become superbugs,” said Professor Trevor Lithgow, director of Monash’s Centre to Impact AMR. “So I end up carrying superbugs with me wherever I go.” “Then, if I cut my hand in the garden, the thing that goes into my bloodstream is whatever was on my hands at the time, and if those are drug-resistant bacteria, it doesn’t matter how fast I get to hospital, …