Even during a time of goodwill to all men, some things should always be kept to yourself.
We don’t want to alarm anyone here, but most of the things we touch on a daily basis - even at Christmas - are absolutely splattered in noxious, malodorous germs: 90% of paper money has faecal matter on it, the plastic in your wallet has a 50-50 chance of hosting MRSA, our gym bags contain everything from Aspergillus mould to E. coli; and every square inch of our precious smartphones have about 25,000 unsavoury critters scampering around on them. Lovely thoughts indeed.
Read on to see what everyday thing you should never, ever, share with anyone.
Don’t Share Your Loofah
Exfoliating is top-drawer: your aching husk feels incrementally more radiant as more and more useless dead skin drops into the nooks and crannies of your loofah. Oh, and bacteria love it too as dead skin provides a nourishing food source for the gang to thrive! A study published in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology reckons our loofahs not only contain hordes of peckish bacteria, but disagreeable forms of yeast and mould, too. It truly is a biological buffet in there and if you share it with someone else you both get an all-you-can-eat pass. Nom.
Don’t Share Your Towel
Towels are lovely and soft and squishy and even better if they’ve been hanging on the radiator ready to snuggle post-shower. Stick them in the wrong hands though, and they transform into a gloopy hotel for all sorts of unsavoury germs and bacteria. If you’re visiting someone this festive season, maybe take your own one with you? Just a thought.
Don’t Share Your Bar of Soap
Someone may have scrubbed said soap bar directly and vigorously against their undulating body. Especially the parts that are the grubbiest. Do we need to explain more?
Don’t Share Your Razor
This might be the biggest no-no of the lot and there’s two reasons why: no matter who you are—the Queen, a sewage worker, a catwalk model—your face plays host to up to 500 million bacteria per square inch, and secondly, even the best razors open microscopic cuts in the skin creating hubs for viruses and pathogens.
Think about it: if you’re shaving your face with the same razor your girlfriend uses for her legs, you’re inadvertently transporting bacteria from one moist location to another, where they can develop, spread and proliferate in all sorts of new and nasty ways. If someone’s got an STD or a virus—think hepatitis or ringworm—bubbling away in their bloodstream, these can easily be transferred too. Yay!
Don’t Share Your Toothbrush
We humans are a funny sort: whilst it’s perceived as acceptable, nay enjoyable, to lick and nibble another human being from top to toe during moments of shared passion, the thought of sharing said person’s toothbrush is, well, a bit much. The truth is: sharing a toothbrush is much the same as kissing, except with a toothbrush you’re transporting the live bacteria directly to the places the little critters love the most: around the gums and the teeth. Gross, eh?
Now imagine the toothbrush’s owner has bleeding gums and hepatitis and doesn’t rinse after brushing. Like, wow! Our suggestion: if you get caught toothbrush-less and desperately need a scrub, wet a clean flannel, wrap it around your finger, pop some toothpaste on and clean your teeth with that.
Don’t Share Your Lip Balm
Phones. Money. Bum wipes. Steering wheels. Shop door handles. Fingers. Lips. Yuck. (See above.)
(Feel free to share hopes and dreams and spoils with those less fortunate than you though. That’s safe. Happy Christmas!)
This article is exactly like the Original Content available daily from Dollar Shave Club. If you subscribe to the idea of look, feeling and smelling your very best, you also get a free mag every month to read on the toilet. Win-win really.
This is a sponsored article in association with Dollar Shave Club.
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