What diseases can you catch from toilet seats?

[Rico]

My 10th grade health sciences teacher told us the following:

Q: Can you get VD from sitting on a toilet seat?

A: Yes, but a bed is much more comfortable.

:eek:

[Canadjun]

I noticed an article from a few years ago posted on a bulletin board at work to the effect that computer keyboards are much less sanitary than toilet seats, so I thought I’d try some google-fu. I can’t find the particular article that was posted (mainly because with my lousy memory I can’t remember the article’s publisher and I don’t feel it’s worth the bother to write down the source so I can come home and look it up), but this says essentially the same thing.

So, make sure you “hover” when you’re using your keyboard!

[AskNott]

Yes, a toilet seat is unsanitary, but it’s extremely improbable that you’ll catch any disease there.

The surface will have traces of the previous person’s sweat, and some of the germs that were on that person’s butt. However, you are wearing an excellent protective suit; your skin. Your skin does a really wonderful job of keeping you on the inside and pathogens on the outside.

[kelly5078]

@misstenacity's link

A common misbelief is that infestation can be spread by sitting on a toilet seat. This isn’t likely, since lice cannot live long away from a warm human body.

A disturbing statement. How long is long? It’s not unheard of for me to sit on a seat that’s still quite warm from the last person. I should think lice could easily last as long as a seat stays warm.

[Sailboat]

@Canadjun

Yes, it means “has germs on it”. As misstenacity said, squatting over the toilet seat will likely leave the toilet seat a lot more unsanitary than sitting on it, for the simple reason that it’s a lot more likely you’ll be a lousy shot if you’re hovering than if you’re plunked down on it.

But misstenacity said “PLEASE stop squatting over the seat… that’s far more messy and potentially unsanitary to the next person…”

If you can’t catch anything from a toilet seat, the next person can’t catch anything either, so why should said next person care that it’s unsanitary (“has germs on it”)? It’s not the medical aspect I don’t get, it’s the eye-rolling dismissal of the concerns of so-called germophobes coupled with a strident warning not to get germs on the seat for the next person.

You can’t have it both ways.

1. If germs shouldn’t matter to me, they shouldn’t matter to you, right? Ignore the dirty seat.

2. If you don’t want me peeing on the seat because it’s unsanitary, stop laughing at me for not wanting to contact your germs.

Pick either option, but only one option.

Sailboat

[HMS_Irruncible]

@misstenacity

Oh, and don’t use your SHOE to flush, either. Not everyone does this and I’d rather touch a “normally” dirty flush lever than one with stuff all over it from the bottom of everyone else’s shoes. Use your hands and then WASH your hands with SOAP afterwards and you won’t die.

Use your elbow, you’re much less likely to rub it in your eye or stick it in your mouth.

[Chronos]

You can’t have it both ways.

1. If germs shouldn’t matter to me, they shouldn’t matter to you, right? Ignore the dirty seat.

2. If you don’t want me peeing on the seat because it’s unsanitary, stop laughing at me for not wanting to contact your germs.

Pick either option, but only one option.

So you’re saying that you don’t mind sitting in a puddle of piss, so long as you won’t get any diseases from it? There’s more to “unsanitary” than just “diseased”, and some things are just plain gross.

[HMS_Irruncible]

Deleted response, I missed the context of the previous post.

[Hostile_Dialect]

@Sailboat

If you can’t catch anything from a toilet seat, the next person can’t catch anything either, so why should said next person care that it’s unsanitary (“has germs on it”)? It’s not the medical aspect I don’t get, it’s the eye-rolling dismissal of the concerns of so-called germophobes coupled with a strident warning not to get germs on the seat for the next person.

What are you not getting? You can’t catch anything because there aren’t germs on the seat–unless someone hovers and gets germs on the seat. misstenacity is asking people not to hover, so that toilet seats stay sanitary.

@Brain Wreck

Use your elbow, you’re much less likely to rub it in your eye or stick it in your mouth.

I’ve put my foot in my mouth before, sure–but in your eye?

[Lust4Life]

An ex colleague of mine swore blind that he got syphlis from a toilet seat …you mean he was lying all the time?

[nutboy]

scabies-pubic lice-

[picunurse]

Peeing on the seat is unesthetic. Urine is sterile, however, it’s unpleasant to sit in someone else’s.

[HMS_Irruncible]

@picunurse

Peeing on the seat is unesthetic. Urine is sterile, however, it’s unpleasant to sit in someone else’s.

Urine is not sterile unless it’s captured by a sterile catheter. Outside of that circumstance, as soon as it hits any surface it is immediately contaminated by microbes.

[Canadjun]

@Brain Wreck

Urine is not sterile unless it’s captured by a sterile catheter. Outside of that circumstance, as soon as it hits any surface it is immediately contaminated by microbes.

Are you suggesting spontaneous generation? If it’s already sterile it’s not going to be contaminated significantly faster than plain ordinary water splashes.

[HMS_Irruncible]

@Canadjun

Are you suggesting spontaneous generation? If it’s already sterile it’s not going to be contaminated significantly faster than plain ordinary water splashes.

Good lad, the world is coated in microbes, especially smelly toilet seats. And they simply thrive on the moisture and nitrogen that urine provides. The old canard “urine is sterile” is true only inasfar as the urine is contained in your bladder or conveyed by a catheter to a sterile containment device. Once it’s out in the wild world, it’s as nasty as the proverbial truckstop toilet.

So as you’re hovering over that urine-stained toilet seat, wondering how long it’s been there, the question is… do you feel lucky?

[AskNott]

Brain Wreck is right. Even the air is a miasma of swirling microbes. Even a freshly disinfected toilet seat is only disinfected for a minute or less in the air, and once the first sweaty butt sits down, all bets are off. Does somebody else’s pee drops make it more contaminated? Maybe, mayge not. Did the peer have a urinary tract infection? It’s a little awkward to ask. It’s a safe call to say that a poop spot adds to the contamination.

As I said before, though, unless you have an open wound on your sitter, your skin will fend off nearly all the evil stuff you sit on.

[BrightNShiny]

@Outpits

Not to put words in the mouth of the Master, but I don’t think Cecil was referring to body (or pubic) lice when he used the word “cooties”. Cecil knows it is highly unlikely you can get lice from public toilet seats. Cecil was undoubtedly referring to the more charming definition of cootie: “a children’s term for an imaginary germ or repellent quality transmitted by obnoxious or slovenly people.” (New Oxford American Dictionary 2nd ed.)

I don’t see why anyone should care about getting cooties from a toilet seat after the invention of the cootie shot.