Walk into any restaurant, office, sports event or driving your car and you’re sure to see people gazing into the screen or roaming their hands and fingers all over the body of the most dirtiest and distracting unit that you love so much and can’t put down – the cell phone!
New research out of the United Kingdom found mobile phones are a technological petri dish for tens of thousands of germs. Why? Germs multiply in warm places. Between the heat the phones generate and the germs on faces and hands, you’ve got a bacterial breeding ground.
Believe it or not, the filthiest phones can spread the dreaded staph bacteria, which can cause everything from skin infections to meningitis. And where do these germs come from? Your hands and face.
It’s reported that your cell phone can carry up to 10 times more germs than the toilet seat.
Not to speak badly about your little electronic paramour, but here are a few facts you should know:
- Your phone is dirtier than the soles of your shoes, a pet’s dinner dish, kitchen counters and door knobs.
- One in six phones tested had fecal matter on them.
- Each square inch of your cell phone contains roughly 25,000 germs (way more than most of the objects we touch daily).
So next time you take a bite to eat, play with your child, become intimate with your significant other or put your hands in or near your mouth, ask yourself this: ”Would I go run my hands all over a toilet seat and do these things without washing them?”
Think twice next time you have that loving, intimate ‘can’t live without you’ time spent with that dirty little lover of yours, the cell phone!
Fire Chief Sam DiGiovanna
