It’s never occurred to me.
I went yes but its probably more like 65-70% of the time; less if I am headed basically from home to where-ever it is I’m eating, more if I’m stopping somewhere for a fast meal after several other stops inbetween.
No. But if I want to wash my hands in a restaurant for some reason, I’ll take ice out of the water glass and rub my hands with that. Whatever’s left of the melting cube gets dumped on the bread plate or coffee saucer.
I’ll have already brushed my lip or touched my eye, so there’s not much point in a special trip to wash my hands.
Whenever possible. Or, Purell™.
I am aware that this is false comfort, since I’m MUCH more likely to experience severe G.I. distress due to a kitchen worker not having washed their hands.
But still. I wash.
I’ve done this from time to time. In a pinch, even the condensation on a cold glass can suffice.
No. I consider it to be an essential part of my lifestyle to keep my immune system regularly exercised, with exposure to the ordinary pathogens that are encountered in my everyday environment.
So, if the question were just “Do you wash your hands before eating?”, I wonder if the ratio above would change.
How many people wash their hands before taking a cookie from the home-baked plate someone’s passing around at work?
I’m sure someone does, but generally speaking I don’t see it.
I don’t see people washing their hands before taking those little tasting samples at the supermarket either.
Handwashing weakens immune systems. Eat filth; gain resistance; survive. Only the clean die young.
No, unless there is very obvious dirt or contamination it never occurs to me. Same with hand sanitiser, that seems unnecessarily germ-phobic to me.
I try to excuse myself and wash my hands before the food shows up. I try to, I don’t always manage. It’s not a compulsion or anything, I just prefer to after reading something somewhere about how the menus are full of other people’s virus laden secretions and oozements. I believe those were the terms.
My suspicion is that most folks wash their hands before eating at home, but that relatively few do so before eating out.
I’m no absolutist germophobe. I don’t always wash my hands before eating at restaurants, but I try to do so most of the time. When it comes to cookies/donuts at the office, yep, guilty as charged; these are rare treats, and I eat them with unwashed hands while making minimal contact.
I don’t do supermarket samples precisely because I don’t know who’s been touching/sneezing on them.
But if I’m going to eat at, say, Wendy’s - and I order a drink, fries and sandwich - then I’m about to put a kung-fu grip on my sandwich, in addition to touching just about every single french fry in the box. I’m gonna wash my hands first. I sometimes eat a sandwich in my car, on which occasions I’ll take the trouble to keep the wrapper between my fingers and the sandwich.
Contagion is kind of a probabilistic thing. Every encounter with an infectious agent (e.g. every time you touch your lip/eye) is a roll of the dice; if you roll the dice a dozen times, your aggregate chances of contracting an infection are greater than if you only roll the dice once or twice. Even if you’ve already touched your lips or eyes with unwashed hands, you reduce your risk of infection by washing your hand before further incidents of contact.
This. I eat dinner out on average three nights a week and rarely enter the men’s room for any reason.
If my hands feel dirty and I’ve ordered finger food, generally yes.
That’s why I said “not much point” rather than “no point.” I’m also willing to extend the 5 second rule to 60 seconds or so, if it’s not wet goopy food. My attitude has changed a lot since I posted this thread almost 19 years ago.
I do wash my hands at restaurants. I’m a nurse so I’m very aware of what’s on my hands and what I’m touching.
I also pay attention to what I touch in restaurants, too.
The backs of chair often have obvious soiling on them (I use my foot to push the chairs out) and the condiments such as salt and pepper shakers are often dirty looking too.
If I ran the world, all restaurants would have a hand washing area near the front door.
Not everyone needs to use a restaurant’s bathroom, but everyone should wash their hands before eating and it should be made easy. Plus, having a hand washing sink near the door would cause a little social pressure that would encourage its use.
Many people should wash when leaving as well, especially kids.
Nope.
The only exception is if I stopped and got gas on the way. But that’s mostly because I don’t want to smell gas when I’m eating my food.
I AM a wee bit germaphobic when it comes to high concentrate hand traffic areas. I absolutely HATE grabbing the salt and pepper shakers at restaurants. Even more so with restaurants that leave condiment bottles at the table. You can see the grime on the bottles! Ugh!
I ate at a Chinese buffet yesterday, dropped crab Rangoon on the empty chair next to me and picked it up and ate it, that might tell you something about my hand washing.
I am not a germaphobe, but I am in the habit of washing my hands before I eat. So yes, after I place my order, I excuse myself, go to the ladies room, and wash my hands. Sometimes, while I am there, I decide I may as well pee, too. So sometimes I wash my hands twice, once right away, and once 2 minutes later after using the toilet.
Naw. That doesn’t feel like eating. I do try not to handle too much of the cookie, however. I might even use a paper napkin to pick it up if there is a stack handy-by. But I’ll take a cookie and eat it even if there isn’t.
I would eat that unless the empty chair was visibly soiled. So, yeah, not a germaphobe. It’s really just habit.
But I rarely get stomach bugs, so maybe that’s part of why I rarely get stomach bugs.