Get this – your kitchen is far, far dirtier than your bathroom! A survey of 1,400 homemakers found that they clean their toilets more frequently than the kitchen. The correlation between food and water contamination has always been around but experts say that other things in your kitchen like counters, cutlery, chopping plates and other appliances can all have unfriendly bugs which aren’t cleaned away.
The Indian Medical Association survey carried out in 200 urban households found that cleaning kitchens on a regular basis was a lower priority for homemakers than cleaning their bedrooms or living rooms.
The study also revealed that none of the 1400 homemakers interviewed cleaned their kitchens every day though 2% of them scrubbed their bathrooms every day. About 8% cleaned their kitchen every fortnight while 14% cleaned it once a month. On the other hand 33% of the respondents cleaned their living rooms and 22% their bedrooms every day. When asked why the77% of the homemakers said that it was particularly troublesome to clean the kitchen while 68% said a clean kitchen wasn’t that important when guests came over.
The purpose of the survey said Dr Preetaish Kaul of the IMA was to dispel the myth that a visually clean kitchen was germ-free. A recent UK survey had shown that a kitchen sponge was 200,000 times dirtier than the toilet seat and could lead to serious health conditions while another found out how viruses spread by cross contamination from knives and other pieces of kitchenware. Most homemakers tend to blame bacterial infections and other similar episodes on food eaten outside but that’s not true the study suggests.
The most dangerous kitchen zones include
- Kitchen towels
- Interiors of fridge
- Stoves
- Knives and cutting boards
- Sinks
- Here are some tips to clean your kitchen:
- Use a strong disinfectant to sanitise the kitchen area and tools
- Use bone china plates instead of steel plates to serve meals. You ensure additional safety by heating the plates in the microwave before serving food
- Wash your hands after each state of food preparation especially after handling raw meat, poultry or veggies
- Make sure you clean your cutting board, stove and kitchen stoves using a disinfectant every few days
- Don’t over fill you fridge with leftovers and don’t leave cooked food at room temperatures.
- Meats should always be cooked thoroughly
However on the flip side, a senior infection expert said there was nothing to worry about unclean kitchen sinks. He believed it wasn’t possible for dangerous bugs to survive in kitchens that are cleaned regularly and only a few friendly bugs remain. They play a vital part in strengthening our immune system and that’s why a completely sterile kitchen is bad.
Are germs actually good?
This concept is actually based on something called the Hygiene Hypothesis which believes that exposing infants to germs build their immunity. Researchers had studied the immune system of ‘germ-free mice’ and the compared them to mice living in normal conditions with microbes. They found that the former had exaggerated inflammation of the lungs and colon which in humans would signify diseases like asthma and colitis. Growing up in completely germ-free environments can actually be bad for children because since their immune system is never exposed to dirt and germs, their immune system doesn’t learn to control its reactions to these outside agents. Dr Ashwin Mallya however says intentionally keeping a dirty kitchen to promote immunity might be going too far.
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Dr Aswhin Mallya says, ‘Most people have normal immune systems which can mount a response against invading organism. Sometimes the system can get overwhelmed and the germs can have an upper hand. The whole premise of vaccination is to expose the body a strain of bacteria/virus or toxin-like substance which will stimulate the body to produce antibodies so that when the particular disease attacks the body will be ready to fight the infection off. Having said that, a dirty kitchen for the sake of developing immunity sounds just stupid. A dirty kitchen allows the proliferation of germs and also attracts insects and other pests like rodents which can act as carriers of dsome diseases which are not covered by the usual vaccine programs or don’t have universal vaccines like malaria, dengue, leptospirosis, typhoid, etc.’
‘The best way to develop immunity is through good health practices – balanced diet, exercise and adequate sleep. And anyway a normal active child will definitely be exposed to enough pathogens in his day to day life so that he develops the enough immunity against diseases.’