New research has discovered that drinking from the same refillable plastic water bottle can harbour more germs than a toilet seat and is many times worse than licking your dog’s bowl.
The average person’s water bottle was found to have over 300,000 colony forming units of bacteria and most of these germs were the most harmful types known as gram negative rods such as E coli and salmonella.
Don’t discard your container
The researchers don’t recommend that you throw away your container or switch to bottled water. They care about the environment, your health and the nation’s landfills. They simply want you to be aware of the potential for contamination so you can make informed choices.
What choice do you have?
Slide-top versions had the highest germ content, with more than 900,000 colony-forming units per square centimetre (CFU/sq cm) on average. They had the most gram-positive cocci, which have been linked to skin infections, pneumonia and blood poisoning.
Squeeze-top bottles were next with 162,000 CFU/sq cm while screw-top containers had around 160,000 CFU/sq cm. While not as bacteria-ridden as the slide-top lids, drinking from these bottles can still be worse than lapping up water from your kitchen sink.
Straw-top bottles were by far the winners with only 25 CFU/sq. cm because water drips to the bottom of the straw rather than sticking around to attract moisture-loving germs. Nevertheless, that’s only 2 CFU/sq cm less than the average home toilet seat.
Plastic water bottles, especially when exposed to heat or sunlight, are known to leach endocrine mimicking chemicals (hormone disruptors) such as BPA (bisphenol-A) and phthalates that interfere with the body’s natural sex hormones, leading to all sorts of health problems including infertility, early puberty, breast and other cancers, obesity, thyroid problems and heart disease.
What’s the solution?
Stainless steel water bottles or even glass bottles are best as they not only harbour fewer germs, they also don’t leach toxic chemicals into your drink.
Don’t leave your half full bottle in your gym bag. Instead, be sure to run it through the dishwasher or hand wash it thoroughly after every use. You can even use a weak bleach solution (one tablespoon of bleach per quart of water) to sanitize your water bottle.
Sources
www.dailymail.co.uk
www.naturalnews.com
www.treadmillreviews.net