Do you happen to be one of those denizens who abhor (for a very good, legitimate reason) public toilets, especially when nature calls and you need to relieve yourself real fast? Have you ever been caught in the middle of a traffic jam or inside a bus, and felt the need to go to a comfort room, yet you are too far from your destination? How many times did you just hold it off and wait for you to get home, rather than use the nearest public toilet?
If you are one of those squeaky clean individuals who surround the toilet seat with toilet paper or use those nice, attractively designed toilet seat covers, it is time to discard them and think twice about using them. Public health experts contend that in all actuality, toilet seat covers do not stop the spread of germs, albeit they afford germs to gather and propagate. Moreover, using toilet paper to shield your skin from having a direct contact with the cold seat may even make matters about hygiene worse.
In an article published on March 17, 2017 in USA Today by Josh Hafner titled “What happens when you don’t use a toilet seat cover?” it was assured that one is not likely to catch an infection from a toilet, anyway, and “seat covers do not stop germs.”
In the same article, Kelly Reynolds, a public health researcher at the University of Arizona, said: “Toilet seat covers are absorbent and bacteria and viruses are tiny, able to pass through the relatively large holes in the cover’s paper. That means they don’t stop the spread of germs, but the risk of germ transmission from your skin touching a toilet seat is unlikely in the first place.”
So, how do we guard against contamination inside toilets and when using toilet bowls? According to Reynolds, “germs will more likely spread after you flush, when bits of fecal matter blast into the air in aerosol form, a phenomenon known as ‘toilet plume.’ From there, the bits of fecal matter settle on surfaces, contaminate hands, and then get spread to the eyes, nose, or mouth.”
This was corroborated in the same article by Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventative medicine at Vanderbilt University, who did research and dispelled beliefs that people can get infected by sexually transmitted diseases or gastrointestinal problems through toilet seats. As Dr. Schaffner reiterated: “There is no need to worry about catching an infection or anything in toilet seats as they are not a means for the transmission of any infectious diseases.”
Consequently, surrounding the toilet seat with toilet paper “increases the surface area for germs to multiply on,” thus, making it “considerably less hygienic as toilet plumes may have blasted fecal matter to the toilet paper,” explained Raymond Martin, a director with the British Toilet Association, in the same USA Today article.
Although seat covers and toilet paper allow people to sit on toilets, thus, reducing splatter, “the biggest risk in public toilets remains the spread of fecal matter to the mouth from your hands,” Reynolds reminded in the same article. A simple, doable recommendation from the health experts is just to wash our hands, lather with soap, and scrub for 20 seconds before you rinse.
With the pandemic still rearing its ugly head over us all, these reminders should not be too difficult to do. In fact, they should have been practiced long before, but we just took them for granted. – NWI
