Many people don't realize these 13 unintentional but unhygienic behaviors

Some of the actions we inadvertently make in our lives, or some of the behavioral habits we develop in our daily lives, are quietly harming our health. Unfortunately, many people don’t know this. Let’s see how many of these have happened to you?

01

Not cleaning your phone often

The most important thing that modern people cannot let go of is their mobile phones. They play with their mobile phones for several hours every day, but most people do not wash their hands before playing with them. Therefore, after touching other objects, their hands are contaminated with bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms, and then they touch their mobile phones, bringing these microorganisms to the mobile phone body. After a month or two, the mobile phone becomes visibly dirty.

A dirty mobile phone can bring us health risks. Some people will hold their phones close to their faces to make calls, while others will play with their phones while eating with their hands. The microorganisms on the phone then enter the body through the mouth, nose, ears and other channels, posing health risks.

Image source: pixabay

Do you clean your phone often? Some people will wipe the screen with a tissue containing disinfectant alcohol when it gets dirty, but they ignore the sides, back, camera, power button, volume button, data cable interface, microphone interface and other parts of the phone. This is wrong. It is recommended that you wipe your phone with a wet wipe containing 75% disinfectant alcohol every three or four days; if the phone is in a case, remove the case first and clean it inside and out, leaving no dead corners.

02

Hand towels are not washed often

After washing your hands, do you use a dry towel to wipe your hands? Then, do you wash your towels frequently? If the towels used for wiping hands are not often washed and aired, it is easy for bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms to hide, and even become a transit station for microorganisms. This is because towels are cotton fabrics, and their special structure makes it easy for them to be stained with various oils, sweat, dandruff, dust, etc., and they are often placed in a humid environment and lack direct sunlight, which creates conditions for the growth of various microorganisms. Using a towel to wipe your hands will make your already clean hands contaminated with a large number of microorganisms.

If you like to use a dry towel to wipe your hands, it is recommended that you wash your towel frequently and often dry it in the sun. Alternatively, you can also use disposable paper towels to dry your hands instead of a dry towel, or directly air dry your hands.

03

Often rubbing eyes with hands

When the eyes feel uncomfortable or foreign objects enter the eyes, the first reaction of many people is to rub their eyes with their hands. This behavior is very undesirable. No matter whether your hands are clean or not, you should not rub your eyes with your hands.

Image source: pixabay

First of all, our hands only look clean, but in fact there are a large number of microorganisms on them. If you rub your eyes with dirty hands, it is easy to cause eye infection and trigger inflammation such as sty and chalazion.

Secondly, even if you wash your hands very clean before rubbing your eyes, if there is a foreign object in your eyes, rubbing your eyes at this time will aggravate the movement and friction of the foreign object on the surface of the eye, which may cause damage to the cornea, conjunctiva, and palpebral conjunctiva of the eye surface.

Finally, even if you wash your hands very clean and there is no foreign body in your eyes, rubbing your eyes just because you feel uncomfortable in your eyes will also bring some risks. This is because frequent rubbing of eyes will put pressure on the cornea, causing changes in the curvature of the cornea and increasing the degree of astigmatism.

When your eyes feel uncomfortable, the correct way is to let them rest and relax, close your eyes, look into the distance, or apply a warm compress to your eyes. When a foreign object is in your eyes, the correct way is to yawn frequently, blink more frequently, or drip artificial tears to let the foreign object flow out with tears; if this method does not successfully let the foreign object flow out, it is recommended to go to the hospital as soon as possible to ask a doctor for help.

04

Feel free to touch public facilities

There are some commonly used public facilities or public items in public places such as restaurants, barber shops, cinemas, shopping malls, hotels, hospitals, stations, transportation vehicles, amusement parks, public toilets, elevators, gyms, libraries, etc. These public facilities or public items may seem clean and harmless, but in fact they may pose some health risks.

For example, handrails and pull rings on public transportation, door handles, faucets and flush toilets in public restrooms, dumbbells, barbells and equipment in public gyms, books and tables and chairs in libraries, equipment and seats in amusement parks all seem clean on the surface, but when one person uses them and another person uses them, bacteria and viruses will be transferred from one person to another through these public facilities and public items.

Therefore, before using public facilities and public items, we should try to wipe them with wet wipes containing 75% disinfectant alcohol. Do not rub your eyes, mouth or nose with your hands during use. It is best to wash your hands in time after use.

05

Wipe the table frequently with a rag

Many people like to use wet rags to wipe the table, which is of course no problem, but you also need to pay attention to the hygiene of the wet rags. You may not imagine that a small wet rag is an excellent microbial culture medium.

You will be surprised at the number of microorganisms that grow on a rag after one week of use. According to the White Paper on Chinese Family Kitchen Hygiene Survey released by the Chinese Association of Preventive Medicine, in a random survey, the number of bacteria on a rag was as high as 500 billion.

So how do you clean a rag? Many people just wash and wring the rag under the tap, and add a few drops of detergent, but this does not make the rag clean. For rags that are frequently used to wipe the table, boil them in boiling water with a little alkali for 5 minutes every three or four days, and try to replace them with a new one every two or three months. Never use the same rag for years.

06

Flushing the toilet midway

When going to the toilet, many netizens will choose to flush the toilet halfway because they find the smell too bad. In fact, this practice will bring health risks. When flushing the toilet, a strong upward airflow is generated, and a large number of tiny droplets mixed with feces will be ejected at an initial speed of 2 meters per second. If the toilet lid is not closed, these tiny droplets will be sprayed to a height of 1.5 meters above the toilet and enter the air in the form of aerosols, which will not only pollute the surrounding objects, but also easily enter the body through our mouths and noses, posing health risks.

Some people worry that the tiny droplets produced when flushing the toilet will splash onto their private skin, leading to the spread of some diseases, especially sexually transmitted diseases. This possibility cannot be said to be completely absent, but it is very small. Because the premise of infection is that a sufficient number of pathogenic microorganisms must come into contact with the skin, mucous membranes or wounds, and it is difficult to meet both conditions at the same time when flushing the toilet in the middle of using it.

Despite this, we still recommend that you get up first and close the toilet lid before flushing when using the toilet. This can ensure that dirt will not splash outside the toilet and prevent your body from coming into contact with aerosols that may contain pathogenic bacteria and viruses.

07

Wrap food in paper towels

When there are no other food packaging bags, would you choose to wrap food with paper towels? This is not advisable. You should know that in order to whiten paper towels, fluorescent whitening agents are used in the production process of paper towels. After the fluorescent whitening agents come into contact with food (especially oily foods), they will transfer from the paper towels to the food. The higher the temperature of the food, the more fluorescent whitening agents will transfer. Fluorescent whitening agents are not easy to decompose in the human body. After long-term intake, their toxicity will accumulate in the liver and produce potential carcinogenic factors.

If you really need to use something to wrap food, the correct way is to choose food-grade special wrapping paper or plastic bags or fresh-keeping boxes.

08

Dig out the rotten part of the fruit before eating

Many times, we buy fruits but don't have time to eat them. When we want to eat them, we find that some fruits are already partially rotten. It seems a pity to throw them away, so some people will use a knife to dig out the rotten part of the fruit and then eat it, thinking that it will be fine.

In fact, even if you dig out the rotten part of the fruit, it is not recommended to eat the rest. Because when the fruit is rotten, the mold and other microorganisms produced by the rotten part will spread through the juice inside the fruit. In this way, the part of the fruit that still looks intact is also contaminated by the mold, which will also bring health risks. For example, the Penicillium patulin that infects apples and pears can produce patulin, which is classified as a Class III suspected carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. It is very harmful to the human body and can cause damage to the nervous, respiratory and urinary systems, and easily cause nerve paralysis, pulmonary edema, and renal failure.

Therefore, it is not recommended to eat only partially rotten fruits, just throw away the whole thing. When storing fruits, it is recommended to put each fruit in a separate packaging bag to avoid affecting other fruits because one fruit is rotten.

09

Rinse raw meat under the tap

The surface of raw meat is prone to the attachment of pathogenic microorganisms, such as Salmonella, E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, etc. These microorganisms can survive for hours to days. When rinsing raw meat under the tap, the splashes of water during the rinsing process may carry microorganisms and splash onto the sink, bowls, chopsticks and cutting boards around the sink. If we then use contaminated utensils to eat, it may cause human infection, leading to symptoms such as diarrhea and vomiting.

What is the correct way to wash raw meat? Add water to a bowl or basin to soak the raw meat, and gently scrub the surface of the raw meat with your hands to avoid splashing. The utensils used to wash raw meat should be cleaned with detergent and dried in time, and finally wash our hands with soap and running water.

10

Chopsticks are not replaced for a long time

Chopsticks are tableware that we use and wash every day. Many people know that toothbrushes need to be replaced frequently, but they don’t know that bamboo and wooden chopsticks also need to be replaced frequently. After using bamboo and wooden chopsticks for a long time, the surface may be worn, cracked, or not cleaned properly. Food residues adhere to the surface of chopsticks for a long time and may become moldy in a humid environment. Some molds are not harmful to the body, but if the chopsticks are contaminated with Aspergillus flavus, the aflatoxin produced is very harmful. It is a "Class 1 carcinogen" marked by the World Health Organization. When it reaches a certain dose, it has a strong damaging effect on the liver and there is a risk of cancer.

It is recommended that you wash bamboo and wooden chopsticks, dry them in the air or in a dryer before storing them in the cupboard, boil the chopsticks in boiling water for about half an hour every week, and replace them every three months. Of course, you can also use metal chopsticks to avoid the health risks brought by bamboo and wooden chopsticks.

11

Not covering your mouth and nose when sneezing

Studies have shown that a normal person's sneeze contains about 300,000 bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms. If a sneeze is caused by a respiratory disease, the number of microorganisms will increase exponentially. The microorganisms contained in a sneeze can attach to nearby handrails, seats, and door handles within 2 seconds, and these microorganisms can then be transferred to other people through the touch of other people's hands.

Therefore, when you sneeze, you should try to avoid crowds and cover your mouth and nose with tissues or handkerchiefs to prevent saliva from splashing. Don't throw away used tissues casually, but throw them into the trash can.

Some people like to cover their mouth and nose with their hands when they sneeze, but this is not recommended unless you wash your hands immediately after sneezing, because this will cause your hands to be contaminated with microorganisms in the sneeze, and then pass the microorganisms to public objects through touch, and then to others.

In fact, if you can't find a handkerchief or tissue to cover your mouth and nose, you can also cover your mouth and nose with the inside of your elbow. This action can block the sprayed saliva on the skin of your elbow or clothes. This part is relatively dry and is not easily exposed to other public items, which can effectively block the spread of microorganisms.

12

Cover food with gauze

Some families choose not to put away the plates after eating, but to cover the food with a fly-proof gauze. This is not a good practice. Although the gauze blocks flies and prevents them from landing directly on the food, flies will stay on the surface of the gauze, leaving bacteria, viruses and insect eggs. Insect eggs can easily fall from the holes in the gauze into the plates, contaminating the food. Moreover, the gauze is usually not cleaned for a long time, causing it to become increasingly dirty, which in turn brings new contamination to the food.

It is recommended that you cover the bowls and plates with lids or seal them with plastic wrap after eating and put them in the refrigerator to keep them fresh. Of course, it is best to cook less food each time and try not to leave any leftovers.

13

Make the quilt as soon as you get up

It is probably the obsession of our elders to fold the quilt immediately after getting up. However, doing so is harmful to health, except for preventing people from sleeping in.

Image source: pixabay

You should know that when people sleep, their bodies will secrete a lot of sweat and dandruff, which will adhere to the quilt. If you fold the quilt as soon as you get up, the sweat and dandruff will remain in the quilt, and the microorganisms in the sweat and dandruff will multiply and thrive in the residual heat of the body temperature in the quilt. Over time, not only will the quilt smell of sweat, but when you wrap yourself in the quilt again when you go to sleep, these microorganisms will also affect your health.

Therefore, the most correct way to fold a quilt is to turn the side of the quilt that is close to your body over after getting up, spread it out to dry for more than ten minutes, and then fold it up. Of course, you can also choose not to fold the quilt. In addition, it is recommended to dry the quilt in the hot sun at noon once a week.

References

[1] “Small rags, big problems!” White Paper on China’s Household Kitchen Hygiene Survey. 2011-08-31. Chinese Association of Preventive Medicine

Author: Zeng Xinyue, popular science creator

Reviewer: Tang Qin, Director and Researcher of the Science Popularization Department of the Chinese Medical Association