Two Public restroom health dilemmas we all face

USE A WET TOWEL – OR WIPE MY HANDS ON MY TROUSERS? 

Leaving your hands wet is not an option: germs are more likely to stick to damp hands, so if you touch something unpleasant on your way out of the bathroom, the chances are you will take it with you.

But don’t use a soggy towel. ‘I dread to think what you might find lurking on a towel in a public bathroom,’ says Dr Lisa Ackerley, an environmental health expert.

A damp towel is a perfect environment for bacteria to thrive in — there is moisture and a bathroom is often warm, which bacteria love, and there is also food for them in the form of dead skin cells.

By contrast, says Dr Ackerley, wiping your hands down your trousers would ‘probably result in far less germ transfer’.

But it’s not just hand towels in public bathrooms that you need to be wary of. A 2013 study from the University of Arizona found E.coli present in more than a quarter of the household towels they tested.

The answer? Wash them regularly and don’t share towels.

 

SHOULD I WASH MY HANDS IN A FILTHY SINK?

It’s tempting not to want to touch anything in a really grotty public loo — even the taps.

However, you should always wash your hands — though not for the reasons you think, says Professor Val Curtis, director of the Environmental Health Group at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

‘After you go to the loo, the main reason to wash your hands is to help prevent other people getting sick,’ she explains.

‘The bugs that may be on your hands, such as E.coli which can cause food poisoning, are from your body — indigenous to you — and so will not make you ill. But they could make other people you then come into contact with ill.

‘If everyone stopped washing their hands after using the bathroom, it would be a disaster for public health.

So it’s better to wash your hands, irrespective of the state of the bathroom.

‘Also, most of the bugs that make you sick die very quickly in the open, so it is unlikely that any harmful germs will be living on a tap.’

If you’re about to eat, then again, it is better to wash your hands.

Professor Curtis says: ‘Before you eat, you wash your hands because you are trying to get rid of any germs you may have picked up from other people, which could feasibly make you ill.

‘So, again, whatever the state of the bathroom, it is better to wash your hands than not.’

There are some exceptions, however. ‘If someone has a weakened immune system — for example, they’re pregnant or have a chronic health condition such as type 2 diabetes, it may be better to not wash their hands if the sink does look especially scuzzy,’ says Professor Curtis.

‘In this case, it would be advisable that they wash their hands at the next possible opportunity or carry hand sanitiser with them.’