My roommate only washes up if he poops, never after peeing. Now every time I’m in any of the common areas I have to wash my hands after touching anything I haven’t wiped down. Thus, I wash my hands twice every time I use the bathroom; once as normal and again in the kitchen because I touched the taps, light switch and door handle in the bathroom which likely have groin sweat on them… /rant
So Penn & Teller used to do a show called Bullshit where they would investigate things and explain why the “common knowledge” on them was, well, bullshit.
In the episode on handwashing, they took samples from people’s hands, faces, and groins before and after using the bathroom. They came to the conclusion that the before/after on hands was negligible, because most people’s groins are under multiple layers of protection and don’t get exposed to germs.
What they didn’t bring up in the show is that that’s not why you wash your hands when you’re in the bathroom. It doesn’t matter if your asshole is downright sterile, because it’s everything else in the world that is filthy. You wash your hands when you’re in the bathroom because you should be washing your hands regularly throughout the day and it’s easiest to do when you’re already in the room with the soap and running water. It’s got very little to do with anything else you may be doing in the bathroom.
Yep, I’ve always thought that. It’s actually very sneaky of health officials, they are exploiting people’s perception of how filthy going to the bathroom is to get them to wash their hands more. Ends justify the means I guess…
I used to tell patients who I took to the bathroom and then I managed their peri hygiene (with gloves!) that we would still wash their hands even though they didn’t touch anything because it was just a good habit to have.