Washing your hands is so overrated these days
>>Print ViewPublication Date: 11/19/2009
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For a third of the male population that doesn’t find it necessary to wash hands after using the bathroom, I applaud you. I wish I had the same cavalier attitude about my health and the health of those around me, because the added 30 seconds to my life would finally give me the time to catch up on my thank-you cards.
A poll conducted by Harris Interactive found 33 percent of men and 12 percent of women don’t wash their hands after using public restrooms. You’re probably asking yourself how this poll was conducted, because I did. The verdict: Researchers were sent to public bathrooms to hang around and “inconspicuously” spy on 6,000 people (3,000 men and 3,000 women) in order to count how many people took the time to wash up. Surprisingly, some found this data collection methodology a bit unorthodox, but the experiment revealed the pleasing realities of our bathroom use.
What’s even more reassuring is that people like to lie about their true hand washing habits because this same poll conducted 1,000 phone interviews asking people if they do such trivial acts as washing their hands. Eighty-nine percent of men and 96 percent of women claimed to wash their hands after bathroom use.
There is no shame in not washing your hands. The 23 percent of men who are lying about their hygiene habits should wear this badge of honor proudly. Hold your head up high and wave your fists into the wind. With some luck, you’ll have some ricochet residue from the urinal on your hands, and the moisture will spray over to your neighbor waving his fists alongside you.
Some doctors claim clean hands prevent the spreading of germs, so why would anyone purposely try to wash the germs off? I thought we were supposed to be spreading around the seasonal flu along with H1N1: one man’s gift to the next.
The American Society for Microbiology found about 75 percent of people wash their hands after changing a diaper, 42 percent after petting a dog or a cat, 25 percent after touching money and 34 percent after coughing or sneezing. But hopefully with the help of the liars in these polls, those numbers are much higher in reality.
Now, if you’re upset about the remarkably low number of people who don’t wash their hands, you’ll be comforted by the fact that only 32 percent of men and 64 percent of women actually use soap when washing their hands. The poll conducted by the Hygiene Center at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine revealed many men don’t even find it necessary to use soap after using a urinal.
And why should we? The handles on those urinals are perfectly clean, especially since so many people have touched the handles before me. I think there has to be some merit to the 33 percent of men who don’t wash their hands; the other 66 percent are just being paranoid with their fear of certain diseases.
This whole clean hygiene campaign is just getting out of hand. There is obviously a growing trend out there to do away with hand washing altogether. In 2005, Harris Interactive conducted a similar poll in which they found 75 percent of men and 90 percent of women washed their hands after using the bathroom. I’m glad people are finally seeing the truth and the momentum is on the right side. It’s a nuisance to have to lather your hands with soap and run them under warm water for 20 seconds.
So the next time somebody offers to lend a hand, think twice, because you have a whopping two-in-three chance that his hands are clean, and who wants clean hands anymore?
Joe Kim is a graduate student in the College of Engineering and may be reached at opinions@purdueexponent.org.