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Medical Video: 10 Gross Habits You'd Better Quit ASAP
The bathroom is the second most favorite place after the bedroom for most people. In the privacy of the bathroom, you can freely carry out various activities, ranging from bathing, dressing up, to defecating.
You also know that bathrooms are a nest for germs, pathogens, and bacteria, mostly from the rest of urine and feces. According to Charles Gerba Ph.D, a professor of microbiology, the surface of objects most susceptible to contamination are doors and door handles, taps, and floors. Not to mention, your chances of touching these objects and repeating the contamination cycle are not impossible.
Are you sure your habit in the bathroom is clean enough? Check the list below to find out what dirty habits are commonly done while in the bathroom.
1. Play handphone
Free time in the bathroom is sometimes an escape moment from a pile of work and routines. Check Instagram or tweet, for example. Or, it is actually used to reply to office emails or calls from bosses. Are you one of them?
Mobile is the extension of your hand. You certainly won't chew a snack in the bathroom, but maybe you will continue the rest of your lunch when you're done with the toilet. Even though you have washed your hands, but has it ever occurred to you to clean your cellphone? The bacteria that attach to the surface of the cellphone while you hold the food will move to your food, which will eventually enter your body. Or, stick to your face when you receive the next boss's call. Hiiyy..
2. Put a toothbrush near the toilet
If you keep a toothbrush and all the toiletries near the toilet, chances are that you will brush your teeth with stool residual substances. Well you know!
When rinsing the toilet, the toilet water will be mixed with residual urine and feces which can be splashed up to 2 meters in all directions. The splash of water will evaporate and the bacteria it carries (norovirus, salmonella, E. coli, and other germs) will settle between the bristles. Bacteria can incubate for at least a week after the first contact with your toiletries.
Similarly, when you are sick. When brushing your teeth during a cold, fever, or cough, the virus can stick to the bristles and increase the risk of recurrent infections if you don't change your toothbrush after recovery.
3. Hang the towel that is still wet
Hanging a towel after taking a shower and leaving it damp in the bathroom (and not outside in the sun) is the same as mushroom farming. In addition, the fine hairs from the towel also act as exfoliator skin that will remove the remaining dead skin. The combination of the remaining dead skin, damp bathroom temperature, and the smell of used towels will make it easier for germs and bacteria to multiply.
Towels left for long in the bathroom will usually dry out hard due to the deposition of soap, dead skin cells, and dirt. Plus, if you use the same towel to dry your body at a later time, you might accidentally stick the residual steam residue splashed with toilet water onto your face, or even into your mouth!
4. Rarely replace a bath mat
Mushrooms, mosses, and bacteria will accumulate between fur mats and can incubate for weeks. Not to mention the strands of hair loss that are clumping and the dust caught in the mat. Did you know, it turns out that feet have more immunity to bacteria and germs than other limbs? However, another case is if you have abrasions or cuts. Open wounds in the legs will be a gateway for stubborn germs and bacteria to enter and infect your body.
5. Stack dirty clothes on the bathroom floor
Maybe you intentionally left some of the bathroom area dry to use as a place to stack dirty laundry. In fact, the bathroom floor remains as dirty as other areas. Splashes of used toilet water dew will still land on the floor, and you are still at risk to expand the area of spread by touching (or walking) all the surface of objects in the bathroom until then perched on a pile of dirty clothes. Humid temperatures from the bathroom and dirty clothes will make the bathroom air smell musty, and become a nest of breeds of viruses and bacteria.
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