The admission comes after large and small businesses spent millions of dollars and countless hours cleaning their facilities over the past year, with retail stores often cutting back their store hours to accommodate the cleaning.

“Findings of these studies suggest that the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection via the fomite (objects or materials which are likely to carry infection) transmission route is low, and generally less than 1 in 10,000, which means that each contact with a contaminated surface has less than a 1 in 10,000 chance of causing an infection,” the CDC stated.

“…People can be infected with SARS-CoV-2 through contact with surfaces,” the CDC stated in conclusion. “However, based on available epidemiological data and studies of environmental transmission factors, surface transmission is not the main route by which SARS-CoV-2 spreads, and the risk is considered to be low [1 in 10,000.]”

The CDC also claims that “the risk of fomite transmission can be reduced by wearing masks consistently,” even though it admitted that the risk was low.