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Health & Fitness

Can't We All Get Along....With Germs?

     In which the author takes on a tiny adversary and a larger issue.

     A one year old baby drools over a birthday cake and everyone has a big piece.  A two year old sneezes on their cake and some hold back.  A toothless ninety-year old drools on their cake and suddenly everyone is on that new no-sugar diet. This is how we make our choices sometimes, with our guts and not our brains.

     About ten years ago I, a tea drinker, made a rare stop into Starbucks.  The waitress, (I guess they call them baristas) was talking to a customer who really, really wanted to know if she was wearing Doc Marten shoes. She pretended she did not know that she was indeed wearing expensive designer shoes and took one shoe off to look at the label. She put it back on and then decided to serve my tea.  “I’ll give you a minute to wash your hands”, I said as a hint.  She saw no reason why she should wash after handling her shoe but did so half-heartedly to shut me up. So appalled was I at the complete lack of any standard of cleanliness that I called the Department of Health. (There was no manager in the store.) The health department inspector called me back the next day saying the barista was a “real piece of work” who knew nothing about sanitation and had a bad attitude.

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     Most people really came down on me for ratting out the barista but I asked them if they wanted their mother or their child eating at that particular Starbucks and they all said  “no way.” But it seemed it was okay for other people to eat there.  Incidentally, that Starbucks is no longer in existence.

     Another time I was in a busy pizzeria and the waitress was taking an “everything” pizza from the oven while talking to customers at the same time. She was very cheerful and friendly but suddenly had to sneeze.  In an effort to avoid doing so in a customer’s face, she sneezed right on the pizza.  This time I said nothing but felt wrong about it.  I sure would not want to eat that pie, and hoped that the hot cheese might kill the germs.  I think I ended up not making a fuss over that since she was a nice girl, and maybe had nice germs.

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         Infection control courses are required in my profession and I learned about a man who accidentally left a package of chicken in his car for a few days.  Of course he threw it out but unfortunately he did not wash his hands.  He got salmonella poisoning and died.  At the supermarket a package of chicken was poorly prepared and leaked juice all over the conveyer belt.  The check-out girl sprayed it with something and went on checking stuff out.  I notified the manager that the station needed to be terminally cleaned and that the young lady needed to wash her hands with soap and hot water.  I got no argument there.

     You might get the idea from these examples that I am on a germ destroying rampage, when in fact I would like to live in a proper balance with them.

     The misuse or overuse of antibacterials can cause problems. Killing all the germs in your mouth with mouthwash can deplete the good bacteria that are supposed to be there. Using antibacterial soap can add to the rise of “super-bugs”, or bacteria that is immune to standard antibiotics.  Unless you have an immune system issue, I feel these types of soaps are harmful and should be a prescription item.  Of course civil libertarian types would fight such regulation as being unnecessary government interference.  If a super bug such as the so-called “flesh eating bacteria” evolves, everyone, including people who never used antibiotics orally or topically could be endangered.

      Should people be free to make really bad choices?  Most of the time I say yes, but if those choices harm the innocent, then the answer is not so simple. If you would like to drink yourself to death in your own home, it is not my business, but once you get in the driver’s seat, it becomes everyone’s problem. 

    

    

       The “hyper hygiene theory” proposes that excessive cleanliness has led to the rise in children’s allergies as the immune system has nothing to do and goes into attack mode (via allergic reaction) over things like peanuts or gluten.  In Europe, many parents “clean off” a baby’s pacifiers by rinsing it in their own mouths to strengthen their children’s immune system. There appears to be a connection to that practice and less allergies especially asthma and eczema.

     Science and medicine are always evolving as we learn more.  The worst thing we can do is to do things out of habit, without questioning if it is the best or only way. As we struggle with the conflict between the rights of the individual and the common good, I hope there is never a true winner, but a careful balance. Just as we try to live with germs, we should respect each other’s boundaries and hope our rights are respected in turn.





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