True...

Although it would help if everyone washed their hands, instead of a very small minority.

Plus with the whole 'green' craze you find more and more places with only the hot air hand dryers and no paper towels to speak of.

Thankfully more and more places have automatic flush and automatic faucets, now they just need automatic doors.

Like Sad said, we have immune systems for a reason. As long as you don't go in and lick the toilet bowls, you will be ok. The more you body is exposed to this stuff in low doses, the better it will defend against major attacks in the future.

We have autoflush and autofaucets where I work, and no doors, just a u-turn to get in. Of course, you can't avoid touching the stall doors.

sadmoronsvote2,

"Unless you are immunocompromised, you will be fine."

That's probably true. I have always believed we Americans are too obsessed with germs. There are many people in this world who live in huts with dirt floors, and they don't die from it. Articles like this only inflame the germ mania in this country. I believe being overly obsessed with germs is classified as a mental disorder by psychiatrists, and excessive cleaning probably only helps to create stronger colonies of bacteria that are resistant to the chemicals used for cleaning. At any rate, we don't seem to hesitate to shake each others hands.

A guy started a new job at a new "hyperclean" restaurant as a server. He got home and told his wife about how sterile it was. "Honey, if someone needs a new fork, I have to hand it to them with my tongs. If they want a roll, I have to use my tongs. Even if they ask for a fresh napkin, I have to use my tongs. The place is so clean freakish that they make the men tie a string around their penis so they don't have to touch it when they go to urinate!" She asked him, "Well how do you get it back in your pants when you finish?"

He replied, "Well, I just use my tongs."

Clorox makes these handy wipes that come in a soft pack. I always clean the seat before plunking my dainty buns down. (the hover maneuver creates splash) LOL

One cannot stress the importance of hand-washing enough! I've been in public restrooms and my jaw just drops when the person in the next stall finishes and leaves without washing their hands! I mean, were they born in a freaking barn?

Nothing kills germs better than bleach.

I was in the women's room once and noticed a little girl carefully putting strips of toilet paper on the seat as her mommy had taught her before sitting down. I think she was more interested in the process than actually using the facility as she had about eight layers of paper there. Her closeby mother told her that it wasn't really necessary.

mozzie,

"Her closeby mother told her that it wasn't really necessary."

It's not only unnecessary, it probably useless since the thing you are most likely to get from a public restroom toilet seat, if anything, is crabs. Putting toilet paper on the seat won't help you either, since body lice, which is what crabs are, can jump quite a distance. I know because I used to work in a department store and had to use the public restroom there all the time while I was at work. I got crabs, and that is the only place I could have gotten it from since I was not sexually active at the time. And that restroom was kept very clean compared to many I have seen.

Mickey, TMI, but thanks for the clarification.

Sounds to me as if these places are not cleaning often or thoroughly enough, otherwise, there would not be colonies too large to count! A regular spray of some bleach based cleaner on the faucets, door and levers would go a long way in reducing the number of germs.

public hand dryers existed LONG before the whole "green" phase.

I wash my hands b/c I think it's disgusting to wipe ones tush and touch handles after you have used the toilet. However, what about the back of your thighs? The parts that actually touch the toilet seat? I try to use those toilet seat covers, but what if they're out? I squat, but one can only squat for so long. Ugh...so disgusting.

@ Kai

Not to be too blunt, but unless you happen to be humping everything on the planet, your dick is probably the cleanest thing in that bathroom. Touching it and leaving if they have auto flush isn't exactly a bad idea....

Public hand driers aren't actually that sanitary. We can go green with hand driers, but they work by sucking air in the bathroom through a filter (that's probably never been replaced) and then shooting that air at your hands. Paper towels, while not "green", are much more sanitary. I hold onto my paper towel and use it to open the bathroom door... shooting the paper towel into the closest trash can once the door is open.

Unsanitary "stall doors" isn't really a problem, we wash our hands after we touch the stall doors. The automatic faucets are cool, but I find they shut off after about 4 seconds... which is annoying. I don't mind the lever faucets as I turn the faucet on... wash my hands. Dry my hands with a paper towel, and then turn the faucet off with the paper towel. One can be sanitary if you're conscious about it. I'm not a germ phobe by any means, but I figure that it can't hurt.

I knew a girl that got pregnant in a public toilet...of course there were two guys in there with her :o )

Icabod: Why were you in a women's restroom in the first place? Sounds perverted to me.

what about the Japanese hand dryers with the germ-killing uv light in it? AND they actually get your hands dry, unlike most hand driers in the US...

Yes, thank you. If folks have issues with the toilet carry toilet seat covers. Why don't folks by a pack from the local drugstore?

Sales of hand sanitizer must be down. Like anyone really needed to read this article to understand that public restrooms are germ playgrounds.

People need to stop the obsessive hand sanitizing, allow their kids to breath natural air and stop disinfecting everything in site. It's funny how the more we clean the more it seems we get sick. Back when I was a child you had Ajax cleanser and either Mr Clean or Pine-Sol. For soap you had Dial or Lava with a few others thrown in for good measure. Now there is specialty cleaning solvents for everything.

Keeping your home "overly" clean for your newborn is going to affect them when they start life in public with daycare coming to mind first. If you protect the human body from germs it will not figure out how to protect itself against them.

Eltex said: "As long as you don't go in and lick the toilet bowls, you will be ok." YUCK! How could you even think such a thing???

There must be a compromise between Eltex and Browns Backer. I agree with BB that OBSESSIVE cleaning is inappropriate and unnecessary, even harmful. However, there must still be a high standard of cleanliness to enable you to be so casual about the topic.

Yes, public bathrooms are germ playgrounds--no surprise. However, taking appropriate care (especially washing your hands with soap for 15 to 30 seconds) is necessary. Are hand sanitizers bad? Only if you use them obsessively. After using a public bathroom and exiting (yes, I do use my paper towel to open the door), it won't hurt to use hand-sanitizer.

Money is another source of many germs (though not as many as bathrooms!). Have you noticed at many retail counters there are bottles of hand-sanitizer for the employees to use? Same at many restaurants, and particularly buffets--very often there is a bottle of the sanitizer at the beginning of the buffet.

I think being sensible is important. Yes, we want our children to grow up begin exposed to some germs, so they will grow up able to fight off the bad germs. That doesn't mean, however, that I would put my baby in or near the floor in a public rest room. Don't be one of the pigs, just be smart!

When I Have To I do but I try and wait to get home - and Train Your Children -

I take those Clorox, mostly or other antiseptic cloth, and wipe plus use those paper covers and of course thoroughly wash my hands. At home we even at home use a 70% isopropyl alcohol and wipe seat and all around. We rarely catch "colds" though we do get a yearly flu shot.

My Wife is a "clean fanatic" ...so I get lucky again....this is or confirms to what I suspected only worse than I thought - not good. Well not the biggest news item but some interesting and informative posts.

Good Luck..............

mozzie-600

Icabod: Why were you in a women's restroom in the first place? Sounds perverted to me.

Women's restrooms are acceptable. Sex in a Roman Catholic confessional or in the back of a hearse borders on perverted.

Ichabod Brain,

"Sex in a Roman Catholic confessional or in the back of a hearse borders on perverted."

Yes, those things are perverted, and I would add that so is sex on the autopsy table in a coroner's lab.

Women's restrooms are acceptable.

Only if you fit the category.

@ Eric 97 LOL, I'm female, Eric...yep, just looked and I've still got the girl plumbing. Gotta sit to pee, hence the clorox wipes.

REALLY there needed to be a study to tell you public bathrooms have germs?? We are germ obsessed, one of the stupidest thing I have ever seen is the home version of an automatic soap dispenser. "You don't want to touch that GERMY soap dispenser". Don't know about you but the only reason I touch a soap dispenser is to get soap to wash my hands (or to fill it up). Either way, I'm washing you hands after. So unless I go licking my hand before I wash them HOW am I getting germs from my soap dispenser???

I'm usually not too worried about germs, but public bathrooms are the exception. Paper on the seat (fancy cover or just strips of TP), good handwashing, and sanitizer or antibacterial lotion after exiting the bathroom are biggies for me. At home, it's just basic cleaning and toss the kids in the tub every day or two. I will jump if the baby got into the dog food again, or found one of those bottles that hid under the sofa for way too long and looks like he wants to drink it.

Inmissouri - mine's eaten at least a pound of dogfood in the one year she's figured out how - yours will be fine :p Apparently it's tasty.

Captain- I'm more worried about the dog going hungry if we don't notice, or the baby putting his hands in my mouth with dog food crumbs still on them. Yuck! Plus it kinda makes his breath stink ;)

I carry an all natural spray that I use on my toothbrush and to purify air and public surfaces called Bocca Pura.

yuk,ugh,ewwwwwie........ and also the automatic flushing.....hmmmm. it flushed b-4 u can get out of there. now think of the flushing germs all over your butt}

so, you are worried about germs. You fuss over bathroom germs. That is only the beginning. Go check out your kitchen or maybe your floors. how many of you lay on your floors to watch tv or maybe you allow your babies to crawl around on floors that are walked upon by shoes that come from outside. imagine what people do to the sidewalks outside. do you ever see people walk their dogs? how about elevators or shopping carts. the list is endless. you can't avoid germs or bacteria and you are wasting your time cleaning your hands. yes, it helps to some degree until someone breathes on you or sneezes around you. We have great immune systems that do a terrific job. the reason why we get sick is because we help break down our immune systems by what we eat,stress etc. exercise and a good diet and maybe some vitamin supplements(i don't think are really necessary) will do more for you than any hand cleaner. Stop worrying. it only helps break down your immune system. go for a walk. a walk will do more for you than any hand cleaner. give people a break and cover your mouth when you sneeze and wash your hands. that will do more to help prevent the spread of colds and flu. otherwise if you keep worrying, we will eventually have to boil people before we have contact. have a nice date.

I do tend to take some toilet paper and hand soap and wipe the seat down, since there are too many men who are too lazy to lift the seat up when they pee. Sadly, when you are in a public restroom, "taking your browns to the super bowl" should be the least of your worries, not more. Restrooms need to remain clean and safe, and it's up to the users to do so, as well as the staff in charge of cleaning and maintaining it.

As far as they are concerned, the "journalism" ends with a good title. Once you've clicked on the article MSNBC gets paid whether or not the article is worth reading.

If you bothered to READ this article, you would have known that the report will be made public tomorrow. You will probably find a link to the actual study sometime tomorrow afternoon. Skup, you are correct that journalism is not what it used to be.

Its like watching the 6pm news on a Monday evening and hearing the reporter say "We have some very important news that could save your life. Tune in on Friday at 11pm to hear that life-saving information. " If it is that important and could save lives why should viewers have to wait until 11pm on Friday to hear it?

I thought the article implied the study would be published in a professional journal soon. The professional journal doesn't want to broadcast the article free of charge, or they wouldn't make money. I'm sure you could grab the article from the journal itself once they've published it... or any sort of professional search engine (like EbscoHost) might turn it up.

The point of this news article is to cut to the chase and tell you the gist of what the journal article will say. Basically, public bathrooms are nasty is the gist of it.

You think mens rooms are bad? Try going into women's restrooms. Women are SLOBS.

Hans, I agree whole-heartedly. If you don't want to expose yourself at the urinal, at least lift the seat.

BJs65, worked at a restaurant in college and found the same thing. Women will leave used tampons laying around.

People, in general, are disgusting creatures.

drunk women are the worst-when i worked in a bar, i would go to the restroom to find the commode full of number 2 and absolutely no toilet paper in the commode - apparently they drop a load and do not bother to wipe-later the same women leave with some strange man for the night- i can only imagine what a disgusting mess the guy runs into as he makes his move once he gets her alone-

"Pigs, every one of them, even with college degrees."

Why does it seem to be that way? In the building I work in I would say the lawyers who work here (all with good pay/high education) are the worst in the bathroom when it comes to cleanliness.

I think it's a class mentality...they think they are priviliged and therefore the people who are under them can clean up after them. Even when the cleaning crew doesn't come in until after the building is closed and it's the other tenants in the building who have to deal directly with it.

Thanks, Alabama hick. I will stay the heck out of Alabama. People don't even wipe their butts there.

Now imagine it was your job to clean those toilets. We are complaining about walking into a bathroom stall and seeing unsanitary conditions. However, there are people out there whose job is to clean up that mess. That is why we should always speak and say nice words to the janitors (many of whom are immigrants) that cleaned bathrooms at airports, work places and other public venues. They should be treated with respect because they are performing tasks that many of us would never undertake. I can't imagine doing that job day in and day out. The inability to block out those nasty bathroom images will surely prevent me from enjoying my nightly meals. I don't know how janitors do it, but what I do know is that every time I see one I am always sure to say a word of kindness and appreciation.

Apparently Alabama's women sh&t don't stink or stick

Might want to be careful on over cleaning your hands or using too much antibacterial santitizer on your hands.

I've read that our fingernails produce bacteria that fights against the germs we pick up through the day, so if you are using antibacterial santizier or clean your hands too often or too much then you kill the good bacteria your fingernails produce and when you pick up the bad bacteria you are less likely to beable to fight it off.

Being careful is one thing, but going from one extreme to another can be just as dangerous.

Damien, does that mean you are a non-handwasher? Ewwww!

Believe me, no one can fight off hepatitis.

It's true, overwashing your hand can be very dementrial to you. Your body produces bacteria that fights off many of the nasty germ you come in contact with every day. In fact your body developes a natural defense against the most common germs you find on door knobs, toilet seats, sink faucets, etc, etc.

Unless your hands are just down right dirty from dirt, etc, it's best to just run some water over your hands instead of using soap. This has been proven many, many times.

Being over causious about germs can actually subject you to various infections.

When the US was populated by europeans during it's development, many of the native indians subcomed to verious illnesses because their bodies didn't develope an immunity to the various germs europens had developed antibodies against.

At one time, the wearing of gloves, by both sexes was common, mainly to ward of germs people came in contact on a daily basis. Perhaps this act should be brought back if people are concerned about the germs they come in contact with on a daily basis, included the practice of shaking hands.

What's the point of washing your hands, and then touching a dirty doorknob which non-washers have probably touched?

Because it gets the sticky urine and feces residue off of your hands.

We took environmental samples in Microbiology class also. The bathrooms were gross but not as bad as I expected. The cleaning staff at our college does a pretty good job. The most surprising find was when a student swabbed the elevator button down the hall. It grew 100 times more colonies and the variety of bacteria was astounding. So there are all kinds of objects that are hardly ever cleaned that we touch everyday.

All I can say is... Wash your hands. No need for antibacterial soaps because most germs have become immune to it and most people do not leave it on their hands long enough to kill anything even it did. Just washing your hands with regular soap will take care of things.

We also swabbed specific areas for Biology when I was in school. We have all our respective petrie dishes laid out on the lab counter to watch our cultures grow.

I took mine from the boy's rest room off the gym.

Went to class one Monday, and noticed my cultures were missing from the counter. My Prof said " You are growing something particularly nasty, and I locked it (along with a few others) in the specimen room.

Turns out I had cultured a form of necrotic Staph. This breed of Staph is also known as a "flesh eating" bacteria. My culture had to be destroyed.....obviously.

Yes, our immune systems are geared to protect us, but there are some things out there that can do conciderable damage, ( BTW...this staph kills quick) so you must take proper hygene steps...not only for yourself, but the next person who steps into the stall after you.

Remember this nasty stuff came from a school, not an airport....be a good teacher to your kids about rest room "protocol".

marinmom, no. What an idiotic assumption to make from that post.

@pam montgomery

wtf there was flesh eating bacteria IN THE SCHOOL BATHROOM that school needs to clean the fricking bathrooms

Snake,

Many of us harbor that same bacterium in our skin. The school can clean the bathroom, but as soon as someone with the bacteria touches a surface, it will be contaminated again. Unless the bathroom is disinfected after every single person uses it, finding bacteria, including potentially nasty strains of staph, is not only possible, but probable.

SnakeBitLegend: There are many types of "flesh eating bacteria". One of them is Streptococcus pyogenes - the same bacteria that causes strep throat. Another - Staphylococcus aureus, also one of the most common bacteria out there (causes pneumonia, ear infections, mild skin infections). Many people are carriers of these bacteria. In fact, EVERYONE has S. aureus on them some where (typically on your skin).

Typically, one doesn't get the necrotizing effects of these bacteria unless they are immune compromised or are already fighting some other infection.

i agree. i'll take a full-on flu over a vaccine... i'll be stronger when it's over and done with.

I don't think you know what a vaccine is...

i don't think YOU know what a vaccine is.

here, i'll help you out:

from dictionary.com: any preparation used as a preventive inoculation to confer immunity against a specific disease, usually employing an innocuous form of the disease agent, as killed or weakened bacteria or viruses, to stimulate antibody production.

from wikipedia: The influenza vaccine, also known as flu shot, is an annual vaccine to protect against the highly variable influenza virus.

Most people don't know what a full-on flu is or they wouldn't be eager to experience one. Most of the time what people think was the flu was actually just a common cold. The flu knocks you out hard for over a week, usually several weeks. People die from it.

If you get a flu vaccine and you feel sick for a couple of days - that isn't the flu. It might be a symptom of your immune system activating but it isn't the flu. The flu is a horrible experience.

"Sorry, but I am of the belief that if you expose yourself to these nasty germs you become resistant to them and do not get ill."

Sorry but immunization through exposure works to a great degree, obviously, but it's no panacea - I'll leave the taste sampling of fecal chloroform, listeria, and hep c, to try to build up an immunity to you, Dad....but please was your hands so that you don't spread your experiement to those trying to avoid exposure (which also works very well).

Antibacterial soap is extreme and perhaps is nonsense BUT so is the fact that so many handle their junk and wipe their behinds and never wash their hands before touching things the rest of us have to handle (i.e. before eating). A little reason and civility in public & with interaction or peers would go a long way on slowing disease spread.

As for JerkInClothes': "i agree. i'll take a full-on flu over a vaccine... i'll be stronger when it's over and done with."

What do you think the vaccine does? Hint: it builds up your immune system so your own immune system is prepared to fight it! If you've got a bulletproof constitution by all means stay away from it but also stay away from everyone else when you're volunteered to get sick and perhaps be the carrier who contaminates others. Sheesh...

here's one thing that i think a vaccine does: it makes you dependent on them, and by doing so, it makes you weaker (in pretty much every sense of the word).

i've had the flu. it sucks, there's no doubt about it. and yes, it can kill you, but so can cutting yourself. so can swimming. and breathing.

how long have humans been on this earth? i'm not talking about homo-erectus, i'm talking ALL humanoid species. and even before that, how long have animals been around? have they not done pretty good without vaccines of any kind? and believe it or not, but many of us have been exposed to the flu and our bodies fought it off.

and you're all forgetting something important, probably because it wasn't mentioned in the article. the bacteria that was found in the bathrooms... how did it get there in the first place? did it spontaneously appear? did it arrive via ups? probably not. someone (or a slew of someones) left it there. were there any corpses lying around? were there any people on their deathbeds congregating around the bathrooms?

grow a pair. or not. i don't really care.

JerkInCoolClothes,

That's if you survive the full on flu, you'll be stronger. You must be young because I actually used to avoid the flu shot when I was young. But when I was in my forties I got a bout of the flu that was so bad I wished I was dead. The pain in my muscles and bones was so intense I could not lay in one position for more than 10 seconds. After that flu, I never missed another flu shot again (2004) and haven't had the flu since. A flu of that magnitude for an older individual or someone with a compromised immune system would be fatal. Flu shots save lives, period.

Single Dad, It is wise to avoid OTC anti-bacterial agents as it does alter normal flora and can allow for other, invasive flora to invade. Also, I have done research with a common antimicrobial that is actually found in many products, including toothpaste - I found that it altered the normal GI flora and increased the risk of developing inflammatory bowel disease in genetically susceptible mice (I know, not a human trial - but a useful first step).

That said, there are times that antibiotics are necessary. More importantly, antibiotics work in various ways - none of them will kill off every single organism in your body to destroy some of the bad ones. Yes, antibiotics will kills some of the normal flora or alter pH (which is why women are susceptible to yeast infections after a treatment of antibiotics). Very few antibiotics are actually bacteriocidal, most are bacteriostatic. This means that most antibiotics slow the bacterial growth, allowing your immune system a better chance at killing the bacteria.

JerkInCoolClothes: Flu vaccines work on a different principle than antibiotics. They are two very different things. Flu vaccines are based off predictions of what the most likely flu viruses will be for that season - usually, they are right, sometimes they are wrong. Flu vaccines, like all vaccines, have antigens of the virus they are vaccinating against.

In a normal immune response, the first time you are exposed to a particular antigen, your immune system responds slower (because there aren't any memory T cells and B cells). But the second time you are exposed to the same antigen, your immune system responds quicker because it has the memory T cells and B cells. In fact, many times, you never get even get sick. Vaccines provide a controlled first exposure. So, IF you are exposed to the same flu virus as was in the vaccine, you're immune system will respond faster - often times preventing you from getting sick, and if you do actually get sick, you will be less sick and sick for a shorter period of time.

summer, that's the most intelligent response i've read on here in a long time. thanks for sharing that. i mean that honestly.

JerkInCoolClothes,

You might ask the the older generation who got polio and smallpox vaccines how they're doing vs. those who didn't. Oh, I forgot you can't ask all those who didn't because they are dead, and there are still some older Americans who are crippled from polio. Because of massive vaccinations against these two diseases, young people such as yourself don't even have to think about the death and destruction these diseases caused, you just read about it in history books. Vaccines save lives.

JerkInCoolClothes, You're welcome.

@missy... aaaaaaaand we're back to it... sigh.

people also died during the plagues that plagued medieval europe, and yet, here we are. and believe it or not, but there were those who were infected during those times who survived. and i can almost guarantee two things: polio and smallpox are not gone, and there will be another deadly disease that kills a substantial portion of the population. and if there's a vaccine for it, when/if it shows up, i'll be in a better position to make an INFORMED decision on whether or not i want to take it. you, on the other hand, will probably kill or pay money to be one of the first in line to take it... because you feel you have to.

You are right, small pox is not gone from the entire world, just in America....but not in the developing world. Why is this, because we got vaccinated and they didn't. My informed decision to take a vaccine......watching people dying all around me would inform me.

I'm still scratching my head as to why I would have to kill someone to take a vaccine, you usually just stand in line.

So, killing a third of the known world in the Middle Ages is your suggested cure for disease as opposed to taking a vaccine? I agree with the others I had the polio vaccine, etc. and what we will never know is whether I would have been crippled by polio. However, we have dramatic proof of your suggestion, just count the dead or crippled.

Single Dad, the problem is that not all people have great immune systems-namely the elderly or people with cancer or diabetes. The fact that you do not feel it is necessary to wash may kill someone.

@missy, it's not even gone from america. it's still alive, quarantined, safeguarded against release. as far as your 'informed' decision, it's not really informed if you're scared into making it. your decision has already been made to get a vaccine, not matter what it's supposed to protect against. how informed is that?

@dakota, i never suggested that killing anyone is the cure. but i've had the flu before and i fought it off. so i don't need a flu vaccine to fight it off if i ever catch it again. and if you'd read my other posts, you would have read that when the new deadly plague hits, i'll make an informed decision about whether or not to take it at that time. that means considering a number of variables, not the least of which are risk to exposure, risk of infection once exposed, effectiveness of the vaccine, how deadly the disease is, side effects of the vaccine, and so on.

like i said before, if you want to be cattle, following the herd to whatever unknown destination, be my guest. but consider this... the study mentioned in the story highlights what they found recently. but what they found has been there from the day public (and private!) bathrooms were invented. it wasn't a big deal to you until you were made aware of it. when you were a kid, you didn't care what you put in your mouth or what you touched. yet you survived. now you're scared into being vaccinated for this or that, washing your hands, not touching something, etc? that sounds paranoid to me.

and before anyone misreads me, let me make this clear: i'm not suggesting not bathing, not washing your hands, not being clean, not being careful, etc. PLEASE take a bath. what i AM suggesting is to think first. you're full of organisms, some of which are deadly (that's right, deadly) to other people (consider the spanish explorers). but yet here we all are. don't rush to get vaccinated just because some 'expert' says that there's some bacteria on a toilet seat now. there are other, far more obvious threats to your health you could spend your time worrying about.

Smallpox is gone from the world. There hasn't been a single case of it anywhere since the UN and WHO vaccinated the entire planet. Yes, there are some stored samples of it in the US and Russia for research purposes (and constant debate about whether we should destroy those samples and be done with it forever but losing any chance to learn about how it behaves in case a new, similar disease comes along), but there hasn't been a case of smallpox in over 30 years.

And let us not forget that it was once the most common cause of infectious death in the world.

And to JerkInCoolClothes, you don't seem to understand how the flu works. That you fought off last year's flu confers you no immunity to this year's flu. Have you forgotten about the Spanish Flu epidemic in 1918? 3% of the world's population died from it and more than a quarter got sick. Surely you're aren't pretending that only those who had never had the flu were the ones who got sick and died, are you?

Influenza is a highly mutable virus. When you hear the talking heads on TV mention "H1N1" or "H5N1," they're talking about the various types of flu. Those letters refer to specific proteins on the surface of the virus and the numbers refer to variations of those proteins. If you had one variant of the flu (say, "H3N2"), you are still completely vulnerable to other variants (such as "H1N1") and if it is a particularly lethal strain, you run a very serious risk of dying from it.

For your talk of making an "informed decision," it seems you are failing on the most important pieces of information: Actual knowledge of the immune system, how it works, and what a vaccine actually does. Are people going nuts about the possibility of a single germ coming within a three mile radius? Yes. But to claim that going in for your vaccination is "be[ing] cattle, following the herd to whatever unknown destination" shows a severe lack of comprehension which belies any claim you might have to being able to "make an informed decision."

Short version: Get your shots, wash your hands, don't panic over the bathroom.

do i really have to lay things out line by line? show me where i mentioned, or even implied, that catching the flu once made me immune to each variation. i know you can't. so i'm not sure where you got that.

also, know the difference between a pandemic and epidemic. the flu of 1918 was no epidemic. calling it an epidemic in one sentence and then saying that 3% of the world's population died from it in the very next sentence reduces your credibility in my eyes. so if you can't get that right, and that's a pretty significant mistake to make, how can i take the rest of your 'lecture', including the paragraph on informed decisions, seriously when you yourself aren't all that informed?

as much as i want to respond to your post, i can't. at least not until you know what you're talking about.

short version: read before you respond, understand what's being said, then take your time. you'll end up wasting less of it.

Hey JerkInCoolClothes. Just so you can be the informed person you say you are, Here is the definition of epidemic.
An epidemic (επι (epi)- meaning "upon or above" and δεμος (demos)- meaning "people"), occurs when new cases of a certain disease, in a given human population, and during a given period, substantially exceed what is expected based on recent experience.[1]:354[2] Epidemiologists often consider the term outbreak to be synonymous to epidemic, but the general public typically perceives outbreaks to be more local and less serious than epidemics
So I am just spitballing here but I would think 3% of the world's population probably exceeded what they expected.

sigh... epidemics are SEASONAL outbreaks. the 'common', or annual, flu, can be an epidemic. a PANDEMIC is a GLOBAL outbreak, usually associated with a strain of some bug that's never been seen before. so this is where you need to pay attention: the annual influenza bug can be an epidemic, and it frequently is. however, the spanish flu of 1918 was a PANdemic. why? because the same bug affected people all over the world in a single outbreak.

understand? there's a HUGE difference in the description of an outbreak. if you're going to talk about how uneducated i appear to be, at least get it right.

@JerkInCoolClothes:

Did you or did you not say the following:

"but i've had the flu before and i fought it off. so i don't need a flu vaccine to fight it off if i ever catch it again."

Ergo, you seem to think that you don't need a flu vaccine. You seem to think that if you catch a deadly form of the flu, you will magically survive because you've had the flu before.

It doesn't work that way. You may have had the flu, but you didn't have a deadly form of it. You caught it at a time when you weren't particularly vulnerable to it (children and the elderly, those with compromised immune systems, etc., are more likely to die from the flu.) Flu is one of the more deadly diseases out there.

And you clearly don't understand the definition of "epidemic." It has nothing to do with "seasons." An epidemic is when a disease is more widely spread than typically expected. Seasonal flu is expected to infect a fair number of people and thus, we don't refer to it as an "epidemic." It's when even more people come down with the flu than we would expect...even during "flu season"...that it is considered an "epidemic."

A "pandemic" is simply an epidemic that is widely dispersed in geography. That's why it's called "pan"demic rather than "en"demic. Pandemic are necessarily epidemics because we do not expect to see such diseases spread so widely. All pandemics are epidemics. Not all epidemics are pandemic. If there is an outbreak of measles in one city, that's an epidemic because we do not expect to see a large case of measles (though these days, with people refusing to vaccinate their kids, it's becoming more common.) But if there is a nation-wide outbreak, that makes it pandemic. It's still an epidemic because we are seeing more cases than we normally would expect to see. It's the fact that it's beyond geographic boundaries that have us describe it as a "pandemic."

All squares are rectangles. Not all rectangles are squares.

Short version: You don't know what you're talking about. The more you dig your heels in, the more trouble you cause for yourself.

you're assuming an AWFUL lot, especially when (or maybe because?) you don't understand context. do yourself a favor... stick to things you DO understand. you'll waste less of everyone's time.

or better yet, educate yourself, then come back. but only after you've done your homework.

The squatters make the biggest messes. Just sit down already.

If you are a squatter...CLEAN THAT SEAT BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE STALL!

Not all of us are physically able to squat!

If you have the runs, squatting can seriously mess up your pants as well...

I never do #2 in public restrooms - I would rather hold it for a day than take a chance...

Carry some baby wipes or Lysol spray with you (it comes in little cans) and clean or spray the seat first. Use the seat covers. Wash your hands, grab the doorhandle with the paper towel and leave. Simple.

@bjs65 - THANK YOU!!!!

to all you "squatters" out there - you are the reason bathrooms are so nasty and disgsting. thanks to your squatting, you spray urine and fecal matter all over the seat...and decide not to clean it up before you leave. the rest us lucky ones get to sit in your mess afterwards. if everyone would just sit down you wouldnt have to worry about a darn thing. a toilet seat should be the least of your worries in a public restroom.

You folks just need to get into that stall bright and early, before the post breakfast crowd arrives. Thats when things get ugly quick!

I have been a nurse for over 35 years and I can say with all honesty that I have NEVER seen a sick person with a disease that was infected from a toilet seat. Nobody and I mean nobody wants to go in and sit in someone else"s pee...or whatever. Sit the hell down and, if you leave blood, pee, or poop on the seat, clean it up--and do a good job of it. The flushing alone send millions of E Coli and Staph into the atmosphere for about 10 feet depending on the extent of the flush mechanism. You are going to breath it even if you wash your hands....Not that washing isn't a good idea...It is the best way to prevent disease. That is where most diseases come from. Yep...Worked in Public Health for three of those 35 years. I have had some men and women SWEAR they got some STD or another from a toilet seat, but there has never been any evidence to support that this is true.

Whether or not you get an STD from a toilet seat depends a great deal on what you are doing on that toilet seat.

Exactly. Unless you have a health issue, basic hygiene does the trick. Wash your hands afterwards, and if you're nervous, don't touch the door on your way out of the bathroom (best design is one you can just push open without touching). But chances are you will then touch something else likely covered with germs - the shopping cart, the ATM keypad, the money you hand to the cashier or that the cashier hands to you, etc.

The more important point - that these articles never address - is that most of us do NOT get sick from these encounters. Instead these articles feed into fears that we all should be germophobes and avoid germs at all costs.

or paranoid

I'm sure there are germs in hospitals that I wouldn't want to get on my d***.

There is a class that they have in medical school that teaches you not to pee on your hands when urinating. Besides, most human urine is sterile when it leaves the bladder.

I find the bottle of alcohol works best if it's empty. There's more room in it for the urine that way.

Hey, truckers do it all the time!

@avesraggiana

As noted earlier unless you are pissing all over your hands, your junk is cleaner than the palm of your hand.

to avesraggianna----amen to your comments; also it doesn't show much respect from the idiots that are talking to someone as they are in the stall grunting and fa----gg!!!

Also, I'm on the road a lot delivering Winnebagos from the factory to dealers, and one time at a truck stop saw this slovenly, unkept guy come out of the stall, go right by the sinks, and a few minutes later I saw him at the buffet line!!!! Needless to say, I no longer frequent buffets, much as I enjoy them. I just hope that when I order off the menu instead that the cooks and waiters have washed THEIR hands.

" I've never caught anything from them"

Typhoid Mary probably had a rap like that ;-)

Billions of years is a bit of a stretch. Most anthopologists put it somewhere under 200,000 years.

Your right, thanks for the correction, my bad!

It's like an article from the Onion ^-^

I'd like to see a study of the germs found on a McDonald's Playspace/Playland play structure.

You could do that, but first you'd have to remove all the dried feces and discarded food you find in there. And yes, it happens quite a bit.

No kidding? I figured they were unclean, but ew.

"Gimme a break. Poop isn't hard to clean up. Doing it properly apparently is."

Speaking of give us a break - Getting it the bowl, so that someone else doesn't have to clean it, ISN'T hard either - give it a try!

LOL!

Agreed!

A lot of people think that the women's bathroom is cleaner than the mens. Boy, have I got news for ya'll!! I used to work for a very popular country bar and, as bad luck would have it, I was required to keep the bathroom clean and supplies stocked. Women should be ashamed of themselves, especially the young ones. Total PIGS!

hey John Scott I agree that no one wants that job now. the way the jobs & economy is going 2 years from now thats going to be an executive position. Harvard just added the 4 year course. Replacing the asset and property future development course