Keyboard Bacteria: What Lurks There?
Posted on Sep 21, 2009 | Comments 0
With Swine Flu Prevention being such a buzzword recently, there is an emphasis being placed on avoidance of any kind of contact that will promote the spread of the virus from person to person.
Sure we think of public loos or toilets and other public spaces as being a likely harbor for the virus that is looking to spread, but one thing that we often overlook is our very friendly neighborhood computer keyboard!
Keyboard Bacteria
It has been suggested that computer keyboards can harbor bacteria more even than your average toilet seat!
So the next time you are typing and eating any kind of finger food at the same time, say a fruit or a sandwich, give a thought to what you may be eating along with your snack or meal.
Some bacteria that has been found on a computer keyboard is seen not only to be resilient enough to survive for an hour or two, some lasted as long as a day and were even seen to grow in the interim! A study found that some computer keyboards can have five times the amount of bacteria that can be found on a toilet seat!
QWERTY Tummy
A QWERTY keyboard may be most desirable in your cell phone, but a QWERTY tummy; well not so much! Supposedly dirty keyboards with bacterial infestations can house the kind of bugs that can cause a serious stomach upset, leading to the term QWERTY tummy, a stomach upset caused by bacteria found on a computer keyboard.
In a study, researchers found bacteria such as e.coli, coliforms, staphylococcus aureus and enterobacteria on keyboards that were studied.
The bacteria housed on a computer keyboard can cause a bunch of problems ranging from a mild tummy upset, to diarrhea, and even food poisoning! Several reasons are put forward for this kind of bacterial build up:
- Eating meals or snacks / finger foods while working at the computer
- Multiple users for a computer mean that the keyboard changes hands several times a day, leading to depositing and spreading of bacteria. This is sometimes known as hot desking where there is a rotation of desks among co workers; which can also allow for this bacterial build up
- Not washing hands enough and poor personal hygiene or worse not washing hands after going to the lavatory is another other reason
So while you would not dream of eating off the toilet seat, we merrily continue to eat at the computer, so next time you do this, give a thought to what you ingest along with lunch!
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