The 12 germiest places in your life
October 26, 2007 by Sherry Osborne
Filed under Parenting
We’re constantly bombarded by commercials featuring this cleaner with bleach, that anti-bacterial soap for our hands, wipes, everything. One of the most revolting ads out there is the one for Clorox bleach wipes that features a voiceover warning that, “if you clean your counters with the same sponge you may as well be doing THIS” as a woman cheerfully wipes her entire kitchen down with a drippy piece of raw chicken. GROSS!
I’m one of those people who refuses to get caught up in germ-o-phobia. I use soap. Regular soap. I use plain old multi-purpose cleaners for household stuff. I get antibacterial soap if that’s the product that happens to be on sale that day, but I won’t go out of my way because I don’t think antibacterial is necessary unless you’re scrubbing in for surgery. When my kids drop something on my floors, I tell them to blow it off and if there’s nothing fuzzy sticking to it, to go ahead and eat it.
That being said, I do take care to avoid recklessly coating myself in germs, I’m a firm and regular hand washer, and I am more vigilant during cold and flu season. So that being said, MSNBC has listed the 12 germiest places in your life, including your purse, kitchen sink, public drinking fountains, and your friendly neighborhood playground.
Some of the things wouldn’t be handled by your kids, but many of them are, and even if you get sick, you can bring those germs home to your family, because HEY! Sharing is fun!
You can check out the entire list over here as well as the best way to protect yourself. Then go wash your hands.
Are you worried about germs or are you pretty laissez-faire?
I am not a big worrier over germs. We eat things that have fallen on a clean floor. I am not the best with handwashing, though I do tend to do better during the germy seasons. I refuse to buy antibacterial soap, I get Soft Soap instead. If someone gets sick, I go through the house and wipe down pertinent areas and try to stay away from others so we don’t spread our germs. If I have a friend with a sick child, then I appreciate them doing the same.
My mother on the other hand…won’t even come to see us if we have a sniffle… Amazingly for my lack of germ care (knock on wood), we each maybe only get one cold a year. Every few years we will pick up a stomach bug and one year the kids and I got the flu, but overall, we are a healthy bunch.
I just the list! Yikes, now I will be running for the hand cleaner! The one that really suprised me was wet laundry!
Hi, just followed a link over from Self-Made Mom. I also am not a germophobe and refuse to buy anti-bacterial anything…well, except toilet cleaner. I like me some bacteria-free toilets.
You know what commercial just killed me? It was maybe a year or two ago and was basically saying that if you love your family you should put paper towels in the bathroom instead of regular towels so that your kids won’t get germs on their hands…I can’t remember exactly how it went, but the message was so heavy-handed. Honestly, like a family doesn’t all share each other’s germs anyway? And like we need EVEN MORE paper waste in the world?
Not a big worrier at all. We’re oversanitised and over-antiobiotic-ised (yeah I made it up) in Australia and this has lead to a massive increase in food allergies and a lowering in immune system function.
Good for you for blowing off the fuzz and putting the food back in the kids’ mouths. One day they’ll thank you for it.