There was a news post that recently came out that seems to have disturbed a lot of people. Airport security trays apparently have a ton of germs on them and they are worse than the toilets in the airport. This new finding does shed a light on something we didn't know and now has caused quite a bit of worry among most of the population.
I think this story is not that big of deal and it's a drop in the bucket of things we use on a daily basis that have germs and bacteria. What prompted officials to study and release their findings on airport security bins? Those same scientific officials should release a study on everything we use.
How about the belt that holds up your pants? It's the first thing you touch before you go to the bathroom and the last thing you touch when you are finished before you wash your hands, it never gets washed or cleaned.
Money is another bacteria and gem infested item that changes hands on a regular basis, it also never gets cleaned and we handle it all the time. It has already been proven that physical money is one of the dirtiest things on this planet and the main cause for spreading disease and viruses.
Escalator handrails, you know the rubber rails that move along with you while you stand on the moving stairs in shopping malls, think about all the sticky, snot,bacteria,blood,sweat,food, dirt and grime that comes off of the human traffic and on to those handrails on a daily basis. I once saw a kid at the top of an escalator standing there with his tongue on the rail as it rolled along, and I wondered how long he had been there and if I got his saliva on my hand from the rail after it had made a full rotation. Where were his parents?
We can worry about hygiene all we want and we can use all manner of hand sanitizers and antibacterial products to protect us from the germs out there but the truth of the matter is that we need to get dirty sometimes, we have an immune system for a reason, to protect us from those germs and diseases. If we eliminated every germ from our lifestyle, our immune system would weaken and we get extremely sick or die the next time we encountered any sort of bacteria or germ. There is such a thing as being too clean.
There is such a thing as being too dirty as well, there has to be a happy medium where you meet in the middle. Not too dirty and not too clean, a balance or equilibrium.
Don't worry about the next public hygiene alert, I'm glad there are people out there finding major areas of bacteria buildup, but I'm sure there are tons of areas we haven't even thought of yet. In the meantime I will wash my hands and let my immune system do its job.
Scott Goerz
