fomite

Etymology

A back-formation from fomites, plural of fomes, a borrowing of medical Latin fōmes (“tinder, kindling”), used figuratively to evoke the analogy of a spreading infection to a spreading fire.

noun

1. (medicine) An inanimate object capable of carrying infectious agents (such as bacteria, viruses and parasites), and thus passively enabling their transmission between hosts; common examples include towels, dishcloths, kitchenware/flatware, and laundry.
   This must be an efficacious fomite of cutaneous and pectoral disease. 1859, Richard Francis Burton, “The Lake Regions of Central Equatorial Africa...”, in Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, number 29, page 134
   Alternatively, such fluids may be transferred from soiled hands to fomites, or airborne organisms may impinge or settle onto fomite surfaces. Fomites may also serve as a site for the replication of a pathogen, as in the case of enteric bacteria in household sponges or dishcloths. 2009, Raina M. Maier et al., Environmental Microbiology, page 559