It’s called toilet plume.
A toilet plume is the invisible to the naked eye, cloud-like dispersal of raw, infectious sewage particles as a result of flushing a toilet. Flush particles rapidly rise out of the bowl and several feet into the air after flushing. Aerosolized droplets can remain suspended in the air for tens of minutes between users, posing an inhalation risk. These invisible particles go on to coat and spread onto surfaces like floors and counters or objects like hand towels, bathmats, or even toothbrushes.
Why do (especially public) toilets even have a lid that stays up?
Or ones that don’t have a lid and is permanently open…
Because cleaning those surfaces is extra work, toilet is already in a stall that helps inhibit the mist, and the door handle you use to get out is dirtier than anything else in that room.
“A 2024 study showed evidence that even closing the lid may still lead to small viral particles escaping through gaps under the lid, resulting in viral cross-contamination of the air and surfaces in a washroom.”
This is what I remember, there’s no actual solution to this. Still close the lid though!
has an infection ever occured due to the lid being close, seems like it would be too small to cause problems.
That same study also includes this figure,
But the study doesn’t measure other surfaces or things like “a nearby sink” or “a hand towel”. Perhaps for airborne particles they roam more freely, but what about surface particles? I feel like there is more to study.
This is similar to why we all wore masks during the pandemic. No, they’re not always effective, but yes, they reduce transmission rates.
Too bad N95 masks and condoms can’t be made idiot-proof.
Idiot-proof is a misnomer. Better term is idiot-resistant.
Related note. I’m very sad that there isn’t a joke ANSI or ISO document laying out specifications for idiot-resistance standards.
Yes, but there is incredibly strong evidence that mask wearing does reduce transmission rates. I haven’t looked (so definitely correct me if I’m wrong), but I suspect that lid closing likely does not have strong evidence for decreased transmission.
One factor that I think likely weighs heavily into this is that public toilets, where you could be exposed to particles from a stranger dont have lids usually, and they have a much more violent flush, while home toilets are mostly just used by your own household.
We’re not necessarily talking about transmission in this case, just the concept of poo particles spreading widely throughout your bathroom vs less widely
But if you close the lid, all the particles concentrate on it. Then when raise it back up and sit down, there’s a chance you’ll pick it all up with your back.
So the question becomes, do you want shit more evenly spread out in the air or do you want concentrated shit on your back?
You’re… leaning back against the seat?
You presume you don’t?
No you guys are pooping in the wrong direction
I think it can help to lay some toilet paper down before you flush. I found it to be less smelly after doing so.
Before and after. Unless you like that little splash of dirty water on your taint.
Poseidon’s kiss. There’s no dread quite like using a porta-potty in a condition where there’s a risk of that happening.
Of course nothing’s 100% poof. But that doesn’t mean that you should stop. There is a massive difference between the particle numbers.
This seems like the pinacle of sensationalized bullshit. You’re going to be fine. Flushing the toilet has never killed anyone.
There are people who literally eat shit as a fetish. If you’re afraid of the possibility of errant molecules, you need to go outside.
People hear the poop part and overvalue the threat because they’re icked out. That’s just how humans are.
But yeah we have immune systems. These amounts can’t possibly hurt anyone.
I can’t see it, smell it, taste it, and it doesn’t make anybody I know sick. I’m not too worried.
Tell that to Betsy Donovan. She died when the toilet seat was left up.
I had to look up who that was lol
No one considers it a life or death matter. Just gross.
I lived in a house owned by a female vicar once, and all the seats had man traps. This is where the lid will stay up, but when you lift the seat up and let it go it falls back down. These seats would end up pulling the lid down also.
After a while I noticed that these toilets didn’t actually smell that much, because the lid was pretty much always down. By preventing the piss and shit particles from getting up into the air by the lid, this meant that you didn’t breathe in piss and shit, which meant that you didn’t smell it.
Never heard these called “man traps”
I have soft close seats and lids, but they require you to partially close them before they engage.
A man trap isn’t a style of lid though, it’s more about how it’s installed. The seat and lid are installed just a little too far back, such that the lid leans against the cistern but when you lift the seat it never full reaches 90°, and just falls back down. So guys always have to hold the seat up while they pee, and it’s always down ready for women.
A soft close lid is the cure for this, actually. The tension in the soft close mechanism keeps the seat up.
Just sounds like a great way of having a guy piss all over when the seat closes mid stream.
Unless your toilet lid is airtight, you’ll never fully defeat the plume.
Just keep your toothbrush in a case
With cleaning in general, there is never fully anything. It’s about abatement. If a measure is (for example) 80% effective, the whole chain forward will have contamination numbers 80% lower. So even if you keep your toothbrush in a case, it will have (again, made up numbers here) 80% less contamination. Which, depending on the microbe, it could mean the difference between a immuno-compromised person catching or not a disease.
Now, in your house, you do you. But it baffles me that the norm for public restrooms in the US, even in hospitals, is to have no lid at all.
it baffles me that the norm for public restrooms in the US, even in hospitals, is to have no lid at all.
No lid is easier to clean, no expert but that might mean less dangers overall. Especially hospitals must have thought this through.
I call 'em “farticles”
Which would make your colon a farticle accelerator…
It is how I build my immune system.
– Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Except their statement is backed by science.
Idk who’s downvoting you, but you’re actually right. It’s called coprophagia and it’s way more common in everyday life and in nature than we’d like it to be.
YSK to not be scared of every little mundane thing in life. It will paralyze you
How is this considered being afraid? It’s science. It literally happens so why not just close the toilet seat it’s not like it costs you anything
true, but if I gotta close the lid anyway to stop the cats from drinking from it, I may as well do it before flushing rather than after
…did you stand there and wait until the flush completed to close the lid before?
Agreed. Obviously there are some things that, as we acquire new knowledge that may change daily behavior, need to be reconsidered, but this is not one of them. People will look for the dirty hypodermic in the haystack of swords.
There’s so many other things to care about more. In the age of information, our mental health depends on conscious gate keeping of what we allow to concern us and modify our behavior. Everyone needs to decide their own path but if you don’t and just scroll the feed you’ll go mad.
I wouldn’t consider being cautious about having literal fecal matter in my toothbrush mundane, but you do you.
Everything everywhere is covered in fecal matter. Mythbusters did an episode on it and their control toothbrush in the office had plenty.
Well you should be far more worried then. Because closing the lid or not won’t matter. Your toothbrush is covered in it anyway. Unless you’re covering your toothbrush when you’re not using it.
I keep it behind the cabinet mirror, I’m sure over time that’s better than in a cup next to the shitter. If you’re comfortable keeping your toothbrush out and near the toilet than more power to you.
Unless it’s air tight and you’re 100% clearing out the air… then it’s doing nothing. Things in your kitchen are likely getting shit on them as well. It’s basically a placebo effect.
Don’t forget to put on your armor where in bed with someone, too.
I just recycle it instead. You get used to the taste after a few cycles.
It also stops things from falling into your toilet, pets from getting to the water, etc.
Closing the lid is the only sensible thing to do.
, cocaine.
Found Doctor Rockso!
Haha i actually love that series (and rarely have done cocaine)
Along with this… Normalize dudes sitting down to piss.
Just do it. But also accept folks will laugh at you.
Hell, if you were my friend, I’d rag on you all day for it, but that’s because we were friends, and I also have sat down to piss before. It’s not my preferred method.
Like now that I think about…isn’t it really actually nasty to sit down with our junk dangling inside the toilet bowl? We are all sitting here talking about shit atoms floating through the air… but wouldn’t we be trapping our junk in there with it?
Sit if ya want, but just accept the judgement of others. You can’t escape it.
I’m not a fan of urinary tract infections
No thanks. Balls and dick touching toilet waters a thing for some of us. Having to sit in a tiny ass toilet and somehow maneuver your junk with your hands also getting in there…nah.
I’m sorry but are you 120 y/o and are your balls sagging to your ankles? I have at some time experienced the head of my dick touching the bowl but I have never, and considering the designs of toilets will never, experienced my balls touching the toilet water. And I am not ashamed to say that I sit down to piss pretty much every time
No but I’ve spoken to older people and been told by them stories of these things happening. Guess you never speak to old people? Things happen when you get old. Buckle up! At least you admit the tip part so we can be water tip bros.
I put the toilet lid down all the time.
I even put the lid down before I piss.
who keeps towels and toothbrushes in the shit room to begin with.
thats already gross.
Exactly, personally I like to keep them on the opposite side of my house so that you can’t dry your hands at all.
Or, you know, in the linen closet outside the bathroom door, if you’re not a smart arsed twat.
Oh yeees! Of course the linen closet I have right outside of my bathroom! Why didn’t I think of that!? The bathroom which happens to open into my kitchen, where there are barely any cupboards for my kitchen stuff.
Sorry, my bad, I totally misunderstood.
Are you grabbing a new towel every time you ash your hands?
Mythbusters.
Do whatever you want, indoor plumbing means there is shit everywhere, closing the lid has little to no effect. This is just life, get over it.
Different is between a fart of poo water and a small geyser.
One goes upwards, one goes outwards, it’s the same mass and it travels the same distance, closing the lid is a placebo, but if it makes you feel better then go for it.
Thats what I am saying.
I’ve put the toilet lid down since that mythbusters episode where they examined how much fecal matter got onto toothbrushes that are in the same room as the toilet.
Now my toothbrush isn’t in the same room as my toilet but I still shut the lid.
Spoiler for the mythbusters episode… It was a lot of fecal matter… A lot.
sure, but is it in any way harmful? Not really. Also, same episode showed that there’s fecal matter on the toothbrush not even in the same room as the toilet. There’s just fecal matter everywhere all the time. It’s not a big deal, because of our immune system. In fact, it’s more likely than not strengthening your immune system through exposure.
