9, 10, Never Brush Your Teeth Again!

It turns out that kids who refuse to clean their teeth might be tapping into some kind of inherent wisdom that we all forget as we grow older.

If you needed a reason to never brush your teeth again, a recent study has found that there’s a 60 percent (60%) chance of their being poop on your toothbrush if you leave it in a communal bathroom. Not only that, but the poop is much more likely to not even be your own.

Lauren Aber, MHS, a graduate student at Quinnipiac University, gave a statement clarifying that “The main concern is not with the presence of your own fecal matter on your toothbrush, but rather when a toothbrush is contaminated with fecal matter from someone else, which contains bacteria, viruses or parasites that are not part of your normal flora”.

Researchers at the Quinnipiac University in Connecticut took a look at the toothbrushes of university students who shared a bathroom with at least nine (9) other peers and came up with findings that are bound to disgust every person who ever cared about their oral hygiene.

The results informed that regardless of how well a student stored their toothbrush, at least 60 percent (60%) of toothbrushes found in a bathroom were contaminated with fecal matter. To make matters worse, further tests showed that 80 percent (80%) of the contaminated toothbrushes also had the fecal matter of somebody other than the person using each toothbrush.

To put things in perspective, when the researchers started the study, they expected to only find one or two (1 or 2) contaminated toothbrushes here and there.

The team also informed that people who don’t share the bathroom with anyone else aren’t spared from this either. They still have fecal matter on their toothbrushes, it’s just that it’s their own, not that that’s much less revolting.

The explanation is that these molecules make it onto toothbrushes after spreading through the air as a result of common, daily, much needed and inevitable activities such as flushing the toilet.

And if you thought that you can protect yourself by buying a cap for your toothbrush, think again. Lauren Aber warns that not only do toothbrush covers not protect from bacterial growth, they actually facilitate the growth of bacteria by acting as an environment that keeps the bristles moist rather than allowing the head of the toothbrush to dry out between uses.

To make matters worse, it has also been proven that not even cleaning your toothbrush daily with mouthwash, hot water or cold water does anything to decontaminate it. There is really no escaping it.

Even though it has been proven to not prevent fecal matter from finding its way onto your toothbrush, the American Dental Association (ADA) still advices that those who care about their oral hygiene should still respect a few logical guide lines such as not sharing their toothbrush with another person, rinsing the toothbrush both before and after use, and drying it out.

Image Source: coronadentalnews.com