Antibacterial soap is any cleaning product to which active antibacterial ingredients have been added. These chemicals kill bacteria and microbes. They are no more effective at deactivating viruses than any other kind of soap or detergent.

Some liquid hand and body soaps contain antibacterial chemicals, some that might cause the flesh on your hands to burn. Triclosan is a common ingredient, as is alcohol. Since there is a great variety of bacteria, effectiveness against any given type of bacterium does not ensure that it is effective against unrelated types.

These are generally only contained at preservative level unless the product is marked antibacterial, antiseptic, or germicidal. Triclosan, Triclocarban/Trichlorocarbamide and PCMX/Chloroxylenol are commonly used for antibacterial and deodorant effect in consumer products. Some soaps contain tetrasodium EDTA which is a chelating agent that sequesters metals that the bacteria require in order to grow.

Other microbes also require metals and so it is actually an anti-microbial agent that is widely used even as a preservative. It appears to be fairly harmless in the environment. Overuse of chemicals like triclosan has been suggested to cause sensitive bacteria to evolve resistance to its antibacterial action.

Should any antibiotic be discovered that works similarly to triclosan, this antibiotic's effectiveness to combat infections will be reduced because people will be hosting resistant bacteria already due to their use of soaps containing triclosan.

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