Public Restroom Hand Dryers Spew Out Bacteria Found in Feces

Hand Dryers Serve as Bacteria-emitting Machines

Handwashing is a Basic Yet Tactful Technique to Remain Germ-Free

The ‘swooshhhh’ sound of the hand dryers is a common sight in public bathrooms. Way back, industries wanted to cut down on expenditure, uncover environment-friendly alternatives to paper towels and establish a better alternative to these paper towels for drying hands, an integral part of hand washing etiquette. Hand washing is an art that needs to be mastered to minimize germs in our hands and ensure hygiene. Learn this art from the steps clearly defined at www.firsteatright.com. Hence, hand dryers and jet dryers replaced paper towels and helped industries cut down costs by as much as 99.5%, forego removal of paper waste and shell out limited maintenance cost (electricity consumption is minimal). Organizations, industries and the public were satisfied with this discovery but now, this happiness is short-lived.
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Bacterial Breeding Ground
Handwashing is one of the most effective ways to stay away from germs when done in the right way. But all your efforts of handwashing disappear once you keep your hands under the hot air dispensed from a hand dryer. A new study shows that these dryers act as bacteria storehouses sucking bacteria from the air and dispensing them onto newly washed hands of individuals.

Researchers exposed petri dishes to bathroom air under different circumstances and analyzed them for bacteria in the laboratory. Those dishes exposed to air for 2 minutes with the hand dryer off either did not grow bacteria or utmost grew only one colony of them while petri dishes exposed to air from hand dryer for 30 seconds grew up to 254 colonies of bacteria (average number was between 18 and 60 colonies). People who used jet dryers had 4.5 times bacteria on their hands than people who used a warm air-dryer and 27 times more bacteria than people who used paper towels.

Did the bacterial colonies multiply inside the dryer or were they sucked from the air inside the bathroom? When the scientists added an air filter to the dryers to check this out, results showed that bacterial colonies count fell down by 75% once the filter was added proving that the bacteria splashed on our hands from the air dryer are mostly from the washroom air.

Popping Out Poop
Flushing an open toilet can litter bits of poop and bacteria all over the place up to 65 square feet. These minuscular bits of poop and bacteria are sucked by the hot air dryers and deposited straight onto your neatly washed hands.

There are people who avoid using public toilets at any cost and this bit of news might disturb them to a greater extend as well as approve the ideology of these individuals. Others too need not worry much about this news as most of the bacteria are unharmful. Apart from those individuals suffering from a weakened immune system (mostly seniors) or those hospitalized most others remain unaffected as these bacteria are relatively harmless. The research was conducted in a university health science building where plenty other bacteria were used in experiments in labs and the sample would have surely contained at least some of them. Real-world bathrooms would definitely contain fewer bacteria than the bathrooms used in the study.

Fungi, bacteria and other microbes are present everywhere and just because the hand dryer pukes out a bacterial galaxy does not mean that you are going to be seriously affected by it. Most of these pathogens are unharmful and exposure to them will only strengthen your immune system and help you live longer and healthier.

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Paper Towels Occupy No.1 Position in Drying Hands

Drying Your Hands
Faecal bacteria onto your hands due to a hand dryer might put one in a state of hygienic hysteria, but there is no proof that these bacteria make way for some disease. Also, the hand dryer is only spewing out bacteria from the air mostly found in any place where a majority of people gather together. Some alternatives to a hand dryer include:
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• Hand washing and drying with a paper towel remains as the No. 1 option till date
• Drying your hands after hand wash in public places using a disposable towel
• Using a hand sanitizer soon after washing your hands is a great protective measure that offers protection against germs for 24 hours
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As long as you are washing and cleaning your bathrooms frequently and maintaining its hygiene there is nothing to worry about. It all depends on the number of people using a single restroom that defines the quantity of bacteria present. There is mostly no chance of getting seriously infected by a pathogen from a restroom and it is mostly direct contact with other people that can enhance the chances of acquiring infection.

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