This is Not So Nice

[krys]

I copied this from a support group I belong to. I was really surprised, but I shouldn't have been

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YUK read it; you'll be shocked....

Have you ever noticed gals who sit their purses on public restroom

floors - that go directly to their dining tables? Happens a lot! It's

not always the restaurant food' that causes stomach distress. Sometimes

"what you don't know 'will' hurt you"!

Read on... Mom got so upset when a guest came in the door and plopped

their purses down on the counter where she was cooking or setting up the

buffet.

She always said that purses are really dirty,because of where they have

been. Smart Momma!!!

It's something just about every woman carries with them. While we may

know what's inside our purses, do you have any idea what's on the

outside?

Shauna Lake put purses to the test - for bacteria - with surprising

results.

You may think twice about where you put your purse. Women carry

purses everywhere; from the office to public restrooms to the floor of

the car.

Most women won't be caught without their purses, but did you ever stop

to think about where your purse goes during the day?

"I drive a school bus, so my purse has been on the floor of the bus

a lot," says one woman. "On the floor of my car, probably in restrooms."

"I put my purse in grocery shopping carts, on the floor of bathroom stalls

while changing a diaper," says another woman and of course in my home

which should be clean."

We decided to find out if purses harbor a lot of bacteria. We learned

how to test them at Nelson Laboratories in Salt Lake, then we set out to

test the average woman's purse.

Most women told us they didn't stop to think about what was on the

bottom of their purse. Most said they usually set their purses on top of

kitchen tables and counters where food is prepared. Most of the ladies we

talked to told us they wouldn't be surprised if their purses were at least

a

little bit

dirty.

It turns out purses are so surprisingly dirty, even the microbiologist

who tested them was shocked. Microbiologist Amy Karren of Nelson Labs

says nearly all of the purses tested were not only high in bacteria, but

high in harmful kinds of bacteria.

Pseudomonas can cause eye infections, staphylococcus aurous can

cause serious skin infections, and salmonella and e-coli found on the

purses could

make people very sick. In one sampling, four of five purses tested positive

for

salmonella, and that's not the worst of it. "There is fecalcontamination on

the purses,"says Amy.

Leather or vinyl purses tended to be cleaner than cloth purses,

and lifestyle seemed to play a role. People with kids tended to have

dirtier purses

than those without, with one exception. The purse of one single woman who

frequented nightclubs had one of the worst contaminations of all.

"Some type of feces, or even possibly vomit or something like that," says

Amy.

So the moral of this story - your purse won't kill you, but it does

have the potential to make you very sick if you keep it on places where you

eat.

Use hooks to hang your purse at home and in restrooms, and don't put it

on your desk, a restaurant table, or on your kitchen countertop.

Experts say you should think of your purse the same way you would a

pair of shoes. "If you think about putting a pair of shoes onto your

countertops, that's the same thing you're doing when you put your purse

on the countertops" - your purse has gone where every individual before you

has spat, coughed, urinated, emptied bowels, etc! Do you really want to

bring that home with you?

The microbiologists at Nelson also said cleaning a purse will help.

Wash cloth purses and use leather cleaner to clean the bottom of

leather purses.

THIS IS WORTH SHARING!!! Budd

[Suda]

Good info. Thanks.

Suda

[allan w.]

Pretty much the same thing with the black rail belt on escalators where everyone places their hands !!

[washingtonweather]

krys - after getting my purse stolen - I almost never set it down and certainly never in a public restroom. Mine was taken out of my shopping cart when I was 2 feet away, and my son was sitting next to the purse in the upper part of the cart 14 years ago. i have always bought shoulder purses since then and keep them on my shoulder.

[coolchef]

good advice

here is one i learned as a chef

when leaving the rest room,after washing you hand, grab clean paper towels to push the door open. ya never know what could be crawling on the handle

[johniam]

I only get mildly concerned about stuff like that. Folding money probably has as many germs as anything else. I purchase many things now with a debit card but not totally. I carry a pen with me for customers to sign the receipt when I complete the job of cleaning their windows, but more and more customers quickly pull out their own pens to avoid any possible contact with germs I may be carrying.

And of course there was a recent incident on the Regis and Kelly show. Clay Aiken was the guest and Kelly said something he didn't like and he put his hand up to her mouth and she slapped it away saying she didn't know where it's been, or something. Then Rosie O'Donnell accuses Kelly of being homophobic, but overall, it's impossible to completely avoid germs from other people.

Bathroom floors? Yeah, I never put my wallet on the floor while in the bathroom.

[oilfieldmedic]

Job Security!

[Kit Sober]

Ditto coolchef's one.

Also you can always make a t seat cover with 9 squares of tp.

[Sudo]

Click HERE! for the germiest locations. But my #1 turnoff in the list? Shopping cart handles in the supermarket. You guys ever grab one that was slightly sticky? Quite likely that came from the juices of raw poultry and meat that leak through the packaging. Those fluids are swimming with E. Coli and Salmonella. Really nasty bacteria that can kill... or make you so sick you WISHED you were dead.

sudo

[Nottawayfer]

Pretty much the same thing with the black rail belt on escalators where everyone places their hands !!

I agree!! I can't stand to touch those or handrails on stairs. I open doors where most people are not likely to grab, or I push doors open at a higher spot than is usally used. I use my purse strap to push the buttons on the elevator!!! :blink: :blink: :blink: Maybe I should rethink that one.

Most grocery stores have antibacterial wipes at the door for carts. Thank God for that. I know people who sew a special thing for babie so their little bodies don't have to have contact with the cart. And it is washable. That was a great invention.

Edited November 23, 2006 by Nottawayfer

[lindyhopper]

Well, aren't we a bunch of germaphobes.

I'm with you.

My wife works in the Public Health dealing specifically with accute communicable diseases. So yes, we are psycho about this stuff. A little less so as the kids have gotten older though. I believe she told me that the dirtiest (highest concentration of cfu's [colony forming units]) place in an office is the keyboard and the phone, because they are rarely, if ever, get cleaned. The toilet had something like 10-20 cfu's while the keyboard had like a million.

So don't go licking your keyboard :blink: or you fingers after typing.

John get your hand out of your mouth!

[lindyhopper]

Oh and shopping carts, yeah, eeeooooh.

For kids these day they make little shopping cart covers with built in toys and such. It is the worst to be pushing your kid around in one and look down to see them sucking on the handle.

This is another reason not to eat communal samples that the stores give out, unless they have a toothpick in it I guess. Although, I think a lot of stores have wised up to this and don't do it as much or serve things in little cups or with utencils of some kind. You can damn near have lunch at Costco just from the samples they give out.

[Linda Z]

A little habit I've picked up is to dispense the paper towels in a public restroom before washing my hands rather than after, so that once they're clean, I'm not touching the button or lever that less-careful hand washers have touched. That sounds a bit OCD-ish, but it's a tip I got from nurses.

[Nottawayfer]

Germophobes or not, I like the automatic dispensing towels, soap, water faucets, and toilets. It's really great if you have a public restroom with a large enought entrance that it is curved so don't have a door. The only think you coming in contact with is the bathroom stall door. That's nothing that a paper towel can't handle.

I work at our local county. I bought antibacterial wipes for the counters and public phones. It is disgusting how filthy those counters get. Hands all over them all day....ewww!!!

[socks]

It's true.

Restaurants are the worst. Ever sit down at a retaurant and innocently grab the napkin and put it on your lap, and use the silverware without a thought? Or see a table get quickly wiped clean after 4 Flu-infested sneezy snorters just vacated it. "We can seat you now". Uh...

Casual restaurants - Catsup containers and any condiment with a screw-on cap or lid are the worst. I once saw a table where the little kid poked his finger into the Catsup bottle over and over, among other things. When they left the Mom cleaned his fingers off, and the waitress put the cap back on the bottle and reset. :blink:

I don't carry a purse but I try to keep things off the floors in rest rooms and use the hanger on the back of the door for anything I can hang, although that's marginal at best. Scarey places, bathrooms.

Edited November 24, 2006 by socks