GERMS

The bathroom bandit post and RAD's comment about using a tissue to turn off the water and open the door bring this to mind. Our New Orleans safety seminar was very professionally done by J.J.Keller & Associates. At one point the topic was transfering germs and bacteria among people. For some reason, the instructor walked down the aisle and shook hands with 5 people and told them he had enjoyed having them in the seminar. Then he went on with his presentation. Soon, he told everybody to hold up their hands in the air and he flipped off the lights. He turned on a little 'black lite' he had up at the podium. The right hand of those he had shaken hands with glowed bright white. Lights on. That's how quickly and easily germs are spread in the workplace, especially restaurants, he explained. And, he said, surveys reveal that 90% of the people coming out of restrooms did not wash their hands. Then he told them each to go and wash their hands, this one for a full minute, this one for 45 seconds, this one for 30, and so on. They came back in and he did the light trick again showing that even some of them had washed nothing away and none of them had a clean hand entirely. He revealed a chemical powder he said trainers use in restaurant training using this experiment. He also said, as RAD did, that he always turns off the water with a paper towel and opens the door with one and then throws it back into the trash can.

For those of us who have our toothbrush hanging or standing in an open container, he also said that when you flush a toilet, the bacteria on the water is dispersed through the air for 20 feet in all directions, invisibly. He recommended for that reason that we always run our toothbrush under scalding hot water before using it.

The thing that bugs me the most is to be at a restaurant about to eat and somebody appears whom I know and they walk over to shake hands. I'm eating with clean hands (and a fork of course) and have to shake God knows what and continue eating.
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  • And the problem is that you don't know the level of hygiene being used by those who prepare your food. My husband and I once were having a drink at a bar - not an upscale bar, but a nice one - and my husband left to use the restroom. And so did the bartender. When my husband came back, he said tht the bartender had not washed his hands after using the urinal. We left the bar.

    The good news is that I have lived through it - more years than I think anyone else on this Forum and I seldom get sick. Built up immune system????


    Elizabeth
  • Well I know I'm going to buy a new toothbrush on my way home tonight. Thanks for the great visual, Don. x;-)

    But San Francisco makes a point: If everything were absolutely 100% squeaky clean and sanitary, mankind would never have built up any immunity to any of the horrible creepncrud thingies out there. x;-)

  • Am I the only one who flushes with the toilet seat cover down? My toothbrush is safe.

    Elizabeth
  • I'm a guy. I don't even flush with the SEAT down, Elizabeth. x;-)
  • He's also single Elizabeth. He doesn't even flush!
  • Oh, come on, Don. My bathroom's so clean you could operate in it! And mine doesn't have a half-moon on the door. x;-)
  • I do want to know that people who serve me have washed their hands, and I also like to think my hands are at least fairly clean when I leave a bathroom. But to go through calistenthics to turn off a fawcett and open/close a door with a paper towel while trying to toss it back into the trash can inside the restroom...well that's a little much.

    I hate it when people discuss these things - y'know it's not a very clean world with all us dirty humans running around. Germs abound. And Lord knows every once in a while we find stuff in served food that can really put you off. But goodness sake, this is our world, and this is how we have survived for quite some time.

    I think your instructor is paranoid, and O/C as well.

    PS - My toothbrush is in another room.
  • Leslie: I agree with your thoughts on the subject. Didn't your mother have some kind of saying about eating a bushel of dirt by the time you died? I'm of the opinion that our world is too clean today and our kids don't develop the immunities they need to get through life.

    Not that I want a food handler to leave the bathroom without washing his/her hands, or have my toothbrush contaminated (UGH!), but mankind lived through times when there was a lot less sanitation. Although there was that little thing called the plague. Oh, well, we got a shot for that in the military, right?
  • In my family we always flush with the seat closed. It is better for health and better for Fung Shei closing the toilet seat provides for better cash flow and better cash rentention in your household.
  • Hey I am turbo Texas not WI who is using my turbo in WI?
  • Turbo, a quirk in the system. The poster just prior to you is from WI, so when you replied, their state shows up temporarily. But, you are back home in TX now.
  • Don, I thought you were totally grossed out by the "bandit" post? Now you've got me cringing - "floats through the air" AGHHHH
  • Somehow, crap on the walls and ceiling rises to a higher (or sinks to a lower) level than unwashed hands. Leslie, we're not talking about people who wash their hands every five minutes and refuse to shake hands. I've also picked up the trick of opening a bathroom door or restaurant exit door with a crooked little finger. If I don't, then I'm shaking hands with everyone who picked his nose in the past four hours. I'll sit in the dirt at Taledega and eat fried turkey, but I won't do certain other things. th-down
  • Aha! I am vindicated! Using a paper towel is not really that hard to do...I wash, grab paper, dry, shut off water - so, I'm wasting five to ten more seconds of water, oh well- use paper to open door, toss on the way back to my desk. Not hard. I work in a large office where people are not only careless in the bathroom but coming into work sick because our sick policy stinks, so they have those extra germs hanging around. I know I can not stay 100% germ free 100% of the time, ever, its just not possible, and I'm not obsessive about it. But handwashing is the # 1 prevention for the common cold. And I think that not using a paper to open the door is just like touching the tush of the non-hand washer before me - ICK.
  • I worked with a couple of people who I thought were also obsessive about cleanliness and did the paper towel thing (shut off the fawcet with it and then open the bathroom door to leave). But I always laughed as we walked back to our desks together (of course, we're women and we have to all go to the bathroom together! ;;) ), and they - gasp! - touch the door knobs to the stairwell and the main office area as they open the doors to go through them!x:o

    I used to always tell them that all those germs they protected themselves from on the fawcet and bathroom door now cling to their hands ten-fold! They agreed, but didn't see the irony.

    I'm not obsessive - I wash my hands before leaving the bathroom, but don't use antibacterial stuff. My immune system's fairly hearty. You'll drive yourself batty if you think of all the microbes and biobes floating around us every day, all the time!:-S
  • Call me paranoid, but, I wash my hands for the duration of the time it takes to sing "Happy Birthday" because the doctor's say that is the best length of time, I wash with anitbacterial soap even though it is the actual scrubbing motion that removes most of the germs. I use a paper towel to turn off the sink and the open the door to leave the bathroom. I have a pump alcohol sanitizer at my desk and in the cup holder in my car. I use both often, and when my children get in the car after dance class, or school they use it too, or before we eat in the car or after the drive through ATM etc. I wash down my key board and my phone with Lysol or antibaterical wipes weekly or more often if IT has been using either one to service my area. I use the speaker phone to I won't have to touch the phone.

    I own a restaurant and you better believe my employees wash their hands before they leave the bathroom and again in the kitchen hand sink before beginnig work again. They wash when they come on shift and during their shift they must use the hand sink between tasks or if they have handled another person - such as shaking hands or money etc. We are as clean as we can be. If I haven't seen an employee use the hand sink in a while - I ask them to wash just for the hell of it.

    I don't readily shake hands with anyone - if I do I wash immediately

    You may think I am a freak about germs....but

    My family, knock on wood, doesn't get the flu, or colds or other sore throats we are very healthy
    Despite all of these precautions...last spring I became infected with a resistant staph bacteria through unknown contact on my skin from another person - they say it may have been from someone who coughed and I walked through it and it landed on my skin, or these sneezed and it was on shopping cart and got on my arm or trying on clothes...they don't know. It was skin to skin contact and invaded my skin first. MRSA - I was healthy when it went systemic thank God - I spent 4 days in the hospital on IV medication, and another 2 weeks at home on IV in isolation and another 2 weeks on oral antibiotics.

    Thus I am still working on building my immune system back from having everything good and bad killed by medication. I do all of things listed above - because the doctor recommended washing hands and using alcohol as a means for everyone to keep clean - because others are NOT!


  • Turbo, I'm sorry to hear about your infection, I hope all is well now.
    I'm just curious, do you think that your immune system was comprimised because your are so extreme with your cleanliness? Similar to what was said in some of the other posts we seem to build a tolerance to germs the more we are exposed to them. By you not allowing yourself to be exposed to germs, when it actually happened, might they have had more of an impact on your health?
    I don't do half the things that you do and I've only been sick 1 time in the past 10 years. I'm not saying I roll around in dirt either, but I've heard that all the anti-bacteria things can sometimes do more harm than good. Just a thought.
    I do appreciate that you enforce your cleanliness attitude with your employees! I wish more restaurants did! Take care.
  • Good question. According to my doctors - it had nothing to do with it. In fact, I have become more clean since - based on their orders - I wash longer etc.

    They said that resistant germs are becoming more prevelant and to get them off of you you must wash (for a time to scrub them off) or sanitize. The MRSA - just a freak thing. Because I was in such good shape - immune and otherwise when I got it, I didn't get sick really like I could have been...MRSA I later found out actually can kill and once systemic can develop into pnemonia etc. Thank the Lord I didn't go down that road.

    MRSA is rarely found outside of a hospital - and yet I hadn't been to a hospital since giving birth 7 years ago. I wasn't a carrier - they tested me and my family also weren't carriers. Apparently 30 percent of healthcare workers have colonies of MRSA in their noses and while they don't come down with an infection - that is how it is spread around the hospital and person to person...with a sneeze.

    It can be treated with a nose cream for a 3 month period but belive it or not healthcare workers aren't even tested ( a nose swab and culture) to see if they are a carrier. Bizzare? MRSA is one of the oldest resistant bacterias and thus the are ableto created it with an anitbiotic called vincomyacin? But now there are VRSA resistant bacteria - resistant to the vincomyacin. I know way too much about this thing now..obviosuly I had too much time on my hands in isolation for more than a month (My computer was in my bedroom with me)! There isn't too much literature actually - just from the CDC and what you can pull out of a doctor who doesn't want to committ any opinion to anything.

    I've been find since about the end of March (it started in Mid January).

    thanks for asking.



  • When I started at our company six months ago, the first day of orientation included a training session in EHS. The training coordinator said something that day that has stuck with me ever since and has altered my behavior in certain instances......she stated that Hepititis and HIV germs can remain alive and virulent outside the body for a number of hours. You go to the grocery store and grab a cart and wheel it into the store and go about your shopping. A small paper cut is on one of your hands. The possibility exists that a person pushing that very same cart through the store an hour before you was infected with Hepititis or HIV. Scary thought, huh? I now carry a liquid hand sanitizer in my purse, in the car, at the office.
  • >When I started at our company six months ago,
    >the first day of orientation included a training
    >session in EHS. The training coordinator said
    >something that day that has stuck with me ever
    >since and has altered my behavior in certain
    >instances......she stated that Hepititis and HIV
    >germs can remain alive and virulent outside the
    >body for a number of hours. You go to the
    >grocery store and grab a cart and wheel it into
    >the store and go about your shopping. A small
    >paper cut is on one of your hands. The
    >possibility exists that a person pushing that
    >very same cart through the store an hour before
    >you was infected with Hepititis or HIV. Scary
    >thought, huh? I now carry a liquid hand
    >sanitizer in my purse, in the car, at the
    >office.

    Wait a minute. I can get HIV from a shopping cart? X:o If this is the case, CNN headline news needs to have a breaking news story. My understanding is that HIV dies when it has contact with air and HBV will stay alive up to two weeks in dried blood. You need to double check with your training coordinator. Please report back to us.



  • OK, for you paranoid types, like Don, how often do YOU get colds? Since my kids have been out of school (anyone with school-aged kids understands) I average one cold every other year. Last winter I was cold-free, so my chances are good I will get one this year. Not that my hygiene is poor, but I don't go to extremes. So, those of you who do go to extremes, how often do you get sick?

    Ah Don.... I will start closing the lid before I flush and try to get my wife and son to do likewise. Maybe I'll post a nice big sign above the toilet.
  • It makes more sense to just put your toothbrush away, if you use one. I don't think I've had a cold in 10 years or so and have had the flu once in my life. I'm by no means O/C about this. Just cautious on occasion. I don't blow on other people's trombones either, Musicman.
  • Yep, use a toothbrush since I still have my teeth. And, nope, don't blow into other people's trombones.
  • Well, shoot. I guess that decorative little toothbrush stand I just bought at the Container Store will have to be hidden in a closed cabinet. But wait, I'm no science major, but how do germs that have been - shall we say - deposited into a vessel of water escape and then go flying through the air? Are these some sort of super-race of amphibian germs? Or are we talking about the germs that fly not from the bowl but from the seat and other adjacent surfaces? Not to put too fine a point on it, but I do hate to hide my cute toothbrush holder.
  • There is something about the force of the water spraying microparticles of whatever is in the bowl. Kind of gross when you think about it.

    And you don't have to throw your toothbrush holder away, that would be sad x:-( You can get toothbrush covers in CVS. I was watching a special on CNN a few nights ago and the doctor said that drying your toothbrush fully protects against germs as does soaking it in mouthwash for a few minutes. He also said the same thing about kitchen sponges, I keep mine on a soap holder so that its not flat on the sink and dries all the way through. He said they should be replaced every two weeks, something I did not know but now will do.
  • I think we're talking about the sudden impact of hydrodynamics caused by the thrust-torque of the undertow-whirlpooling effect and the resulting dispersion of bacterial agents sitting upon the water like dust on a lilypad. It's physics, hydroponics and mechanics. Like a sneeze in reverse with the back of your head open. Now you see.
  • Ya, thats what I meant to say.
  • Don, you forgot the quantum mechanics part of the equation.
  • I thought that was called a bidet, which I don't have in my house....
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