Nairobi, Feb 15, 2010 (The Nation/All Africa Global Media via COMTEX) -- A product that could dramatically improve medical care in developing countries may never reach there, unless. Instead, it will beautify homes, handbags et al in the developed nations.

Early this month, The Independent newspaper in Britain began its story on spray liquid glass with "It sounds too good to be true" and added "But true it is."

The liquid glass is a product of nanotechnology, which deals with the smallest of the smallest in molecules. Although a Turkey invention, Nanopool, a family-owned German company, owns the patent.

Nanopool says the glass spray is 100 nanometres thick. That's about 500 times thinner than human hair. As The Independent put it, that's a few millionths of a millimetre.

The sprayed film is invisible, flexible, repels water, dirt, and microbes. They can't easily survive or replicate on it. Additionally, the film is resistant to heat, acids and ultraviolent radiation. Mr Neil McClelland, who is popularising the product in Britain, told the newspaper, " ... the concept of spray-on glass is mind boggling,"

Patent owners aren't revealing most technical details. Mr McClelland only says manufacturing involves extracting silicon dioxide from quartz sand. They then add water or ethanol molecules. It depends on the surface in need of coating. Publicly available information indicates various organisations are experimenting with the glass.

They include food-processing companies in Germany. A hotel chain in Britain and the National Health Service are in the act. Most interesting is a yearlong trial of the glass spray in a British hospital. Official report is due in March. Tentatively, the results are reportedly "very promising." The hospital liquid glass-sprayed equipment, medical implants, catheters--the wire-like probes doctors thread through arteries--sutures and bandages.

The dead haven't been forgotten. The British war graves association is investigating the spray glass potential to protect gravestones from weathering. The Turks--it isn't clear why they were stupid enough to sell the patent to a German company--want to protect the Ataturk Mausoleum in Ankara with the spray glass.

Trials in Germany reportedly indicate surfaces sprayed with the liquid glass are as sterile as those cleaned with strong bleach are. Now bleach products aren't environmentally friendly. And, some supermarkets in Britain have already refused to shelve the commodity when it hits the market. They sell bleach products.