Recent Study Highlights Dirty Bathrooms and Flu Season.
Winter is coming, and we are spending more time indoors and visiting our favorite spots away from home. Remember when Grandma used to bring her own sheets on vacation? Turns out she wasn't crazy, but the hotel room isn't the only place you have to worry about lurking germs and unclean surfaces. A recent study by Reckitt's Lysol Pro Solutions reveals hotels that implement effective hygiene measures can help reduce the spread of germs in their public places by 80%. During their study, they used a tracer microbe that replicates a virus but is harmless otherwise, and the tracer spread from the door handle and elevator button to 13 other surfaces in just a 4-hour period.
Insights from this study(1) , in collaboration with the University of Arizona, as well as other studies Reckitt's has performed, have also shown some pretty unsettling facts about bathroom cleanliness, including germs ejecting from a toilet bowl and landing on surfaces and/or being inhaled. Closing the toilet lid doesn't offer much protection against this kind of cross-contamination and, during cleaning, it is actually possible to spread more germs than you are killing. You can spread the germs from the toilet to the sink, where they can survive up to another week! Surface disinfection is key.
This study(1) was highlighted in the official journal of The Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC). APIC President Dr. Tania Bubb, PhD, RN, CIC, FAPIC, stated that: "This study(1) helps establish a clearer understanding of how pathogens spread and the measures we can take to break those chains of transmission."(7)
(1) Goforth, M.P., Valenzuela, P.B., Clark, J., Boone, S.A., McKinney, J., Ijaz, M.K., and Gerba, C.P. 2024. Impacts of lid closure during toilet flushing and of toilet bowl cleaning on viral contamination of surfaces in United States restrooms. Am. J. Infect. Control. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ajic.2023.11.020
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