Wipe your backside then contaminate iPhone

I have a delicate appreciation and admiration for those nasty germ’y things, the tiny little buggers you try to remove from your body and when left on your person, react in an uncomplicated yet very unpleasant way. I have been reading the internet, there’s a lot to read of course.

I’ve discovered a ground breaking – death defying, at large and at risk activity, that should be heralded as the lead item in the news, pictures may be better filtered, ( or removed entirely ) rather than upset those sitting down to their dinner.

So what is this devilishly human behaviour that has rankled tbaoo out of his “uber” relaxed couch potato existence, well it’s the daily body grooming ( hopefully ) act of cleaning one’s backside and the habit of touching everything in sight afterwards. Now I’m guilty of both of these acts, as we all think we all are. The issue is how good are you at removing the tell tale trace of poop that is involved in such a natural process. ( see comment below – my bride insisted that I emphasise the washing of my hands does actually take place )

This delicate topic is connected to the rather ugly notion running deep within the bowels of the online news services at the moment, i.e. that all smart screen apple products such as the iPhone 4, 3, iPad, iPod and the screens of other so called smart phone / devices might be covered in traces of shit.

Alarmingly enough dear reader, if you’re an active screen user / browser, it’ll be your faeces smeared over the screen. If your an addicted user / browser in the Apple shop, it’ll be someone else’s shit, or a mixture of the large number of snotty, ass wiping little shits, shit, that were touching the toys before you.

Goodness I hear you scream, ( combined with immediate hand washing ) that can’t be true, well I’ve tracked down a remarkable trial of the use of tissue paper, hand washing and of course its hint at their use with backside wiping. It’s a study conducted and copyrighted by : ©  Nuffield Foundation / Biosciences Federation 2009    •   Downloaded from Practicalbiology.org

How good is your toilet paper? (link moved)

Introduction

This investigation follows the transfer of a harmless microorganism from an agar plate, via toilet paper to our hands. This models the transmission of faecal microbes after using the lavatory, and allows us to assess the efficacy of using toilet paper and of hand washing as part of our daily hygiene regime. You can use this method to evaluate different brands and thicknesses of toilet paper and/ or different types of soap. This is an opportunity to think about the commercial application of an investigation and the social significance of its results.

This practical is based on an investigation called Microbes and personal hygiene published in Practical Microbiology for Secondary Schools © Society for General Microbiology.

The purpose of this practical is:

• to find out how well toilet paper stops microbes getting on your hands
• to show how important it is to wash your hands after using the lavatory
• to find out if washing your hands makes a difference.
• to see how pathogens can be transmitted

Procedure

• Label the bases of three sterile malt agar plates with your name, the date and A, B or C.
• Wash your hands thoroughly using hot water and soap, then dry them on a clean paper towel.
• Open one lawn plate of yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae). Wipe the surface lightly with two fingers.
• Lift the lid of dish A. Touch the agar surface lightly with the same two fingers. Quickly replace the lid.
• Wash your hands thoroughly again.
• Wrap your two fingers with one layer of one kind of toilet paper.
• Open another lawn plate of yeast. Wipe your fingers over the surface – trying to wipe them in the same way as before.
• Wash your hands thoroughly again.
• Wrap your two fingers with one layer of one kind of toilet paper.
• Open another lawn plate of yeast. Wipe your fingers over the surface – trying to wipe them in the same way as before.
• Remove the toilet paper and put it straight into the autoclave bag provided.
• Lift the lid of dish B. Touch the agar surface lightly and quickly replace the lid.
• Wash your hands thoroughly again.
• Wrap your fingers again in the same kind of toilet paper, wipe your wrapped fingers on a third lawn plate of yeast, remove the toilet paper into the autoclave bag, wash your hands thoroughly with the type of soap provided and THEN touch the surface of dish C with your washed fingers.
• Tape the lid on the agar plate and give it to your teacher to incubate inverted for 2-3 days at room temperature (20-25ºC).
• Examine the agar plate without opening it.

Questions

• What are you expecting to see on your agar plates?
• What do you think about the different kinds of toilet paper tested by your class?
• Do you always wash your hands after using the lavatory?
• Do your agar plates match your predictions?
• Has every group got the same result?
• If there are differences, are you confident they are because of the different toilet papers?
• From your class results, are some toilet papers better than others? Are some soaps better than others?
• Imagine you are working for a toilet paper manufacturer to test toilet papers, or working for a health promotion agency. Your investigation would provide important information for your employer. How would you improve this investigation to make the results more reliable? What would you emphasise in your final report?

So there we go, we look, we wipe, we hope, we spread and then we touch. Life is full of such things – we just need to manage our actions, wipe our bottoms and hope that others do the same. If they don’t then maybe we need a hand full of handy wipes like the tv Detective Monk.

Remember – touch, wipe then go on living.