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Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Thu Nov 19, 2009 10:30 pm
by VickieP
Hand blowers



Everyone in the cleaning industry has always been told that hand dryers in restrooms are not sanitary, they spread germs and bacteria around. I always thought that this just came from the paper companies because they are losing sales to the hand dryers.

A couple of years ago, I was working with a rep, and I noticed that after he washed his hands and noticed that there were no paper towels, only a hand dryer he left the restroom with wet hands. I asked him about it.

He said that hand dryers blow a lot of germs and bacteria around. He also told me to take a look under the hand dryer next time I was in a restroom. There is a filter underneath the hand dryer that is supposed to be cleaned on a weekly basis.

I looked at one and it looked like it hadn't been cleaned in years. It had layers and layers of caked on gunk (disgusting). Since then I will not use hand dryers in restrooms.

Now this is where the story gets really interesting.

The schools and universities that have had the H1N1 (swine flu) outbreak this year are being told by the health department that they have to take out all of their hand dryers and replace them with towel dispensers because the hand dryers are spreading disease.

I never liked those hand blowers and now I have a reason to not use them.

Please pass this along

so everyone knows not to use hand dryers.

Check this yourself, http://www.snopes.com/medical/swineflu/handblower.asp

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Thu Nov 19, 2009 10:49 pm
by oregontocal
Very interesting. I don't use those machines anyway, preferring to dry my hands on my pants or leave them wet. So now perhaps there's a good reason to not use them.

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Thu Nov 19, 2009 10:58 pm
by avalen
I never liked them either, takes too long to get my hands dry

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Thu Nov 19, 2009 11:19 pm
by VickieP
You know, I've just had a sickening thought (don't go there, Mitch), but I have, on a couple of occasions used them in the bath house to blow dry my hair a little so it wasn't dripping wet, now, thinking of blowing all those germs at my face/head, UCK, can't remember if I got sick afterward or not! Won't be doing that again!

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Fri Nov 20, 2009 12:41 am
by snowball
several years ago a friend of mine told me pretty much the same as was posted so I quit using the blow dryers but never thought to look at the filter if the ones you can see look disgusting what would the ones you can't see look like? and besides that as was said they are way to slow!!!

Thanks for the reminder
sheila

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Fri Nov 20, 2009 3:01 pm
by OutandAbout
That just creeps me out. I will never use the dryer again. I have been using the sanitizing hand wipes for a few years now, and not bothering with the paper towels or the dryer. It reminds me of why I never use the salt and pepper shakers in restaurants without some protection. Either a napkin or my handy sanitizing wipes between me and the shaker. I watched a 20/20 story on how unclean, germ infested these thing are, also included are ketchup bottles and anything else left on the table that everyone can use. Nobody cleans them on a regular basis. Just GROSS. Linda

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Fri Nov 20, 2009 3:10 pm
by JanetA
ever seen a hand scribbled sign on those dryers in a public restroom that read:

press button for a 1 minute speech by our president

Re: Hand Blowers

PostPosted: Fri Nov 20, 2009 3:13 pm
by mitch5252
JanetA wrote:ever seen a hand scribbled sign on those dryers in a public restroom that read:

press button for a 1 minute speech by our president


No, but that's pretty funny.