Do you wipe off the handle of your shopping cart?

[Kulindahr]

I was at Fred Meyer the other day and there was a family just finished with their trolley and pushed it in my direction. It was sanitized thoroughly because their son was sneezing and wheezing. I can't afford to get sick now. But also some employees of Fred Meyer also appeared to be ill. They should take time off work instead of infecting the whole store

I carry Lysol disinfectant with me. It will kill anything!

Wow -- at the Freddy's here, any employee coughing or sneezing gets sent home, after having a free medical face mask slapped on.

And last week during all the snow, I saw an employee spraying and wiping the handles and flat surfaces of the special carts for families with kids and for the disabled.

 

[Kulindahr]

Waste of time. The most germ infested items in society are gas pump handles. Nobody wipes off gas pump handles.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/236562.php

Yep.

I can't find a link, but a store in Oregon had UV units installed on the escalator handles inside the machinery, so any germs they accumulate on the part of the trip where people can touch and sneeze on them get killed every cycle. They may be dirty, but they're sanitized!

 

[Kulindahr]

I'm under the impression that ethanol is supposed to pull all the water out of the cell and basically smash its osmotic homeostasis and innards to bits, rather than disrupt its membrane.

Alcohol denatures surface proteins in cell membranes because alcohol as awesome at screwing with their hydrogen bonds.

Both.

Just BTW, a doc show on TV informed us the other day that washing your hands by rubbing them vigorously under cold water through one repetition of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" is more effective than the quickie scrub/rinse most people do with an antibacterial soap. Maybe stores should put music boxes by their restroom sinks.

 

[Kulindahr]

^




By the way; I remember one of the producers on the TV show Big Brother saying the editors spent more time cutting out shots of the participants' picking their nose than cutting out penises.

Sad.

Most people don't know how to pick their noses in public and be polite about it in the first place. It's actually easy: blow nose gently with kleenex, and while holding the kleenex to cover your nose, discreetly use a pinky covered with tissue to wipe the inside of the nose. I started using the technique when I realized just how often blowing my nose left gross bits visible stuck to nose hairs.

 

[xbuzzerx]

What happens when our concern with being safe isn't keeping us safe?

Our quality of life should come before our imaginary fears, and we ought to eliminate useless, irrational habits.

However, we are overcome with anxiety. The most infinitesimal chance of danger is quantified as unacceptable. Ridiculous protocols are enacted to protect against the most unlikely scenario.

We aren't talking about people erecting bubble domes around their houses. We're talking about simply wiping off a surface that dozens or hundreds of people have clutched in their hands before you did. How do you think most people get things like flu?

 

[dereperez]

What happens when our concern with being safe isn't keeping us safe?

Our quality of life should come before our imaginary fears, and we ought to eliminate useless, irrational habits.

However, we are overcome with anxiety. The most infinitesimal chance of danger is quantified as unacceptable. Ridiculous protocols are enacted to protect against the most unlikely scenario.

Coca-Cola definitely agrees with you about boiling juice, except they don't think there should be any unpasteurized juice on the market. People could die! They used their influence to pass legislation here that made unboiled juice illegal. I watched one of my favorite, small local companies go out of business because Coca-Cola cared so much about our health. (Actually, several small juice businesses folded, but I still miss that one in particular.) Labeling juice as unpasteurized is not considered adequate protection in the face of the science.

The problem with vinyl gloves in food service has specifically to do with norovirus. Norovirus sickens people primarily in concentrated living conditions like dormitories and cruise ships, and is especially dangerous to the elderly. Hysteria about preventing it has led to regulations requiring their use in all food service, because people could get sick! Meanwhile, the quality of food--especially something delicate like sushi--would suffer terribly. Again, no exceptions via disclaimer have been proposed.

Europeans eat unpasteurized milk cheese all the time. I bet some get sick. How 'bout the freedom to choose? I know, I know, there's a chance something bad could happen.

Gluten is not an allergen. It doesn't cause anaphylaxis. Mass hysteria is afoot, and there are no comparable labeling requirements for ingredients that aren't allergens.

I think people are free to be neurotic, so I wouldn't support legislation barring the use of shopping cart wipes. But I find it tempting!

It's all relative. What you deem necessary, someone else might find it paranoia. Do you wash your hands before you eat? Why do you? Are you neurotic? You can be perfectly fine without washing your hands. Why let chance dictate your life? I see plenty of people that just grab a burger or sandwich with their bare hands after touching all sorts of things...and they did not wash their hands. They are still fine.

So someone prefers a little extra layer of protection by using wipes on shopping cart handle bars. It takes all of a few seconds to wipe it down. That is not akin to being crippled with anxiety.

 

[zoltanspawn]

We aren't talking about people erecting bubble domes around their houses. We're talking about simply wiping off a surface that dozens or hundreds of people have clutched in their hands before you did. How do you think most people get things like flu?

Telephones, doorknobs, handrails, money, touchscreens, credit cards, keyboards, pens and pencils....germs are everywhere! Hundreds of people are touching everything. We should simply wipe these surfaces down.

It's all relative.

Why should it be? Shouldn't our fears and behaviors have a rational basis, not an arbitrary one?

Doesn't a widespread social hysteria about germs diminish the quality of our lives?

 

[xbuzzerx]

Telephones, doorknobs, handrails, money, touchscreens, credit cards, keyboards, pens and pencils....germs are everywhere! Hundreds of people are touching everything. We should simply wipe these surfaces down.

Many people in office environments do exactly that if they know their coworkers are sick. At a grocery store you have no idea who touched the cart or what they had.

 

[peeonme]

Is this where we are heading? I believe that we get most colds and flu from air born body fluids that people sneeze or cough in to the air that we inhale, like it or not, we are at risk.
We worry too much.

 

[eastofeden]

Telephones, doorknobs, handrails, money, touchscreens, credit cards, keyboards, pens and pencils....germs are everywhere! Hundreds of people are touching everything. We should simply wipe these surfaces down.

If someone prefers to do so..then yes. They should. If you or anyone else prefers not to.....then don't.

Shouldn't our fears and behaviors have a rational basis, not an arbitrary one?

In a perfect world...I suppose so...but the world is far from perfect. The mass murderer I worked with...I had a "feeling"...or intuition...I was told by a lot of people how "irrational" I was...yet I was right and they were wrong. I suppose that in a perfect world mass murderers wouldn't exist so if we ever arrive in utopia I will re-examine my reliance on intuition...

Doesn't a widespread social hysteria about germs diminish the quality of our lives?

Maybe it diminishes yours but you are hardly in a position to define what quality of life means for anyone but yourself.

I think history will bear witness to the very real threat of germs/disease...and on a current day to day basis we can find all the examples we need

Chances are if you drive a car on a rainy freeway at high speeds with a few drinks under your belt that you may cause an accident and die...or kill others...but considering how many people do just that and don't cause an accident....perhaps we should do away with traffic laws as well? After all...they are about safety.

 

[Daximus]

During cold and flu season I use them occasionally.

 

[zoltanspawn]

If someone prefers to do so..then yes. They should. If you or anyone else prefers not to.....then don't.

That's arbitrary. Of course, people are free to do that. "Wiping down everything" is an over-reaction, impractical, often useless and very possibly counter-productive, but nevermind reason.

In a perfect world...I suppose so...but the world is far from perfect. The mass murderer I worked with...I had a "feeling"...or intuition...I was told by a lot of people how "irrational" I was...yet I was right and they were wrong. I suppose that in a perfect world mass murderers wouldn't exist so if we ever arrive in utopia I will re-examine my reliance on intuition...

So...the world is imperfect...and we ought therefore give up on rational behavior? I don't follow this. I'm not criticizing intuition or irrational behavior in general, but imaginary fears that lead us to neuroses. My argument is about a specific kind of irrationality: an undue insistence of perfect safety.

Maybe it diminishes yours but you are hardly in a position to define what quality of life means for anyone but yourself.

I believe a life lived with anxious and irrational fears about germs is a poor quality life. Others may find mysophobia a rich and rewarding experience. I am admittedly skeptical.

Chances are if you drive a car on a rainy freeway at high speeds with a few drinks under your belt that you may cause an accident and die...or kill others...but considering how many people do just that and don't cause an accident....perhaps we should do away with traffic laws as well? After all...they are about safety.

Yes, thank you for summarizing my position correctly. I am against safety.

 

[xbuzzerx]

View attachment 1026816
Is this where we are heading? I believe that we get most colds and flu from air born body fluids that people sneeze or cough in to the air that we inhale, like it or not, we are at risk.
We worry too much.

Again, this is a ridiculous extreme when we're talking about holding onto a piece of plastic that many other people have touched shortly before you pick up food in a grocery store. If common sense wouldn't tell you that there's a risk of totally needless contamination, science would.

You'd think taking a sanitary wipe and cleaning off a handlebar in a grocery store is like demanding that the CDC maintain a presence at the door and send people through chem showers.

I question how many people laughing at the "silliness" of this want to eat food prepared by workers who have not observed the rules about washing their hands after using the restroom.

 

[figjam]

During cold and flu season I use them occasionally.

I do - and I obsessively wash my hands after visiting the shops. It has helped me to stay flu-free these past 4 years. Shopping carts and baskets are some of the biggest distributors of germs.

 

[figjam]

It is so silly to sanitize the shopping cart handle and then go into the store and touch any number of items from all over - after they have been touched by others.

Not silly - hygienic...

 

[dereperez]

Why should it be? Shouldn't our fears and behaviors have a rational basis, not an arbitrary one?

Doesn't a widespread social hysteria about germs diminish the quality of our lives?

That's arbitrary.

And what's with the problem with "arbitrary"? We don't live in a world of black and white. Technically, washing hands before eating is arbitrary too. We can always adjust the goalposts. We all have our own set of standards that we live by and prefer. It is all relative...or "arbitrary" as you like to call it. And so what?

Other people wiping down handle bars doesn't diminish your quality of life, unless of course you are so bothered by other people's decisions. Someone's neurosis is somebody else's caution, and vice-versa.

 

[Rickrock]

No, I don't wipe down shopping cart handles before using them. Sometimes I wonder if I should, but I haven't yet.

 

[Stardreamer]

I do - and I obsessively wash my hands after visiting the shops. It has helped me to stay flu-free these past 4 years. Shopping carts and baskets are some of the biggest distributors of germs.

I make it point NOT to do most of those things and can say the same thing.

 

[eastofeden]

I make it point NOT to do most of those things and can say the same thing.

...and I make a point to do it when I remember and I often forget to do it...and in 56 years I have never had the flu...

...so it all ends where it began...one's personal choice....

No one is forcing anyone else to wipe their cart...so no problem.

 

[zoltanspawn]

And what's with the problem with "arbitrary"? We don't live in a world of black and white. Technically, washing hands before eating is arbitrary too. We can always adjust the goalposts. We all have our own set of standards that we live by and prefer. It is all relative...or "arbitrary" as you like to call it. And so what?

Other people wiping down handle bars doesn't diminish your quality of life, unless of course you are so bothered by other people's decisions. Someone's neurosis is somebody else's caution, and vice-versa.

Asking that standards have rational bases, not arbitrary bases, isn't insisting on a black and white world. It's suggesting that our standards ought to be enacted for reasons. I would think those reasons ought also be good reasons. I find the idea that our notions of what is dangerous should be decided merely by personal fiat quite bizarre.

I don't enjoy living in a safety-obsessed society...so yes, my quality of life is diminished by other peoples' weird behaviors. I imagine other people might not enjoy living in a post-enlightenment society, or a sexist society, or an impoverished one, and they ought to speak their minds about the state of things, too.