12 most likely (UNLIKELY?)places for germs

[Teresa Cline]

12 Top Places You Risk Getting Infected

In some cases, you may encounter these places numerous times a day. In others, your exposure will be more sporadic. But either way, the following locations are some of the most germ-infested in the entire United States.

1. Your kitchen sink: With more dirt than a typical bathroom, and over 500,000 bacteria per square inch in the drain, your kitchen sink basin and faucet are teeming with germs.

2. Airplane bathrooms: Never mind the fecal bacteria that?s commonly found on door handles and faucets, the worst part is the tornado of germy particles that?s spewed into the air when you flush the toilet.

3. Wet laundry (even after it?s been washed): A dirty pair of underwear contains about a gram of ***, and this gets spread around the entire load of laundry very quickly. It?s not until you dry the clothes that the germs are destroyed.

4. Drinking fountains: All public drinking fountains are loaded with germs, but those in schools -- which contained anywhere from 62,000 to 2.7 million bacteria per square inch of the spigot -- were the worst.

5. Shopping cart handles: While you?re innocently shopping for groceries, your hands are grasping a handle covered in saliva, bacteria and fecal matter from dozens of people.

6. ATM buttons: Think about how often these buttons are touched everyday. Now think about how often they?re cleaned. This explains why one study found an average of over 1,200 bacteria on the average ATM key.

7. Your handbag: Women, your purse is likely overrun with thousands, and even millions, of bugs like salmonella, E. coli, staph bacteria and more. Makes you think twice about putting your handbag on the floor, and then plopping it down onto your kitchen counter, doesn?t it?

8. Playgrounds: Your typical children?s playground is covered in bodily fluids like blood, mucus, saliva and urine.

9. Mats and machines at health clubs: Yoga mat? Elliptical machine? Think bacteria factory. Such mats and cardio machines have been found to contain antibiotic-resistant staph bacteria and more.

10. Your bathtub: Bathtubs contain more than 100,000 bacteria per square inch, some of which you have just washed off your own body.

11. Your office phone: Phones get coated with germs from your mouth and hands, to the tune of over 25,000 germs per square inch.

12. Hotel-room remote control: This little remote has been used by hundreds of other people, and likely wasn?t thoroughly disinfected in between.

Sources:

• Health.com

 

[grace]

I feel so dirty

 

[Teresa Cline]

I feel so dirty

I know, me too...the wet laundry thing really got me!

 

[Smiling JOe]

I wonder how the dryer sanitizes, especially if you use low heat. Those germs won't be killed unless the temp of the dryer is over 180F degrees.

One place/thing which they left off the list is your cell phone. Every meeting I've attended and every bar or restaurant I frequented, cell phones are plopped down on the table or bar. You also use your cell phone in many places, where you don't wash your hands prior to use. In the grocery, pushing those germy carts around, the phone rings, you answer.

I still think the faucet handles for hot and cold water in most public restrooms are potential spots for plenty of germs. You go to the bathroom, then, with dirty hands, you turn on the faucet. After cleaning the germs off your hands, you then do what? That's right, you turn off the water, touching something that every person who washed their dirty hands, has touched WITH their dirty, germ infested hands. I have some ideas for inventions to help save water and keep the water faucets touch free, and I'm not talking about those stupid motion sensors which aren't worth a crap (though that idea was a nice attempt).

 

[jodiFL]

Does the count go down on laundry washed with Tide w/bleach?

 

[30abob]

I certainly don't qualify as a germ-a-phobe. However, to me, the comforter (or whatever you call it) on a hotel bed is the nastiest thing on the planet. They NEVER wash those things! It takes me exactly 2.3 seconds to strip it off the bed when I check-in. I still get shivers just thinking about some 300lb. traveling salesman sitting "bare-butt" on the bed picking the lint out of his toenails.

 

[Smiling JOe]

Since washing machines and dryers don't sanitize by heat, they rely on chemicals or soap. Even the regular tide without bleach should sanitize your clothes if you are not overloading your washer. However, on that note, wet laundry sitting in your washer (after being washed) is potential for bacteria growth due to it being cold, dark, and wet. Leave your washed wet clothes in the washer for a few days, and you will begin to smell the funk. Drying clothes gets rid of the wet environment which reduces the bacteria growth.

 

[Smiling JOe]

I certainly don't qualify as a germ-a-phobe. However, to me, the comforter (or whatever you call it) on a hotel bed is the nastiest thing on the planet. They NEVER wash those things! It takes me exactly 2.3 seconds to strip it off the bed when I check-in. I still get shivers just thinking about some 300lb. traveling salesman sitting "bare-butt" on the bed picking the lint out of his toenails.

or worse!

 

[Romeosmydog]

I wonder if they tested pencils. I know that when I taught school, ALL the pencils smelled just like tee-tee!!

 

[Smiling JOe]

I wonder if they tested pencils. I know that when I taught school, ALL the pencils smelled just like tee-tee!!

Still have those legs!

public pens on the counters at retailers and the pens and touch buttons at credit card swipe machines have to be some really nasty stuff. I've thought twice about using the credit card electronic pen at a few of those big box stores. Makes me want to puke. I carry my own pen.