Katharina Buczek
Everyone in your home likely opens the refrigerator every single day, too, and their hands probably aren’t clean all the time.
You might run home from work to grab a snack before the gym, forgetting to wash your hands of any office germs. Or, perhaps, you’re in the middle of cooking a recipe and realize you forgot to take out a few ingredients. Any residue left on your hands is then transferred to the fridge handle.
This germ hotspot should be disinfected on a daily basis to avoid a long-term buildup.
3. Your Work Area
Those of us who work from home know how important it is to keep our workspace tidy for a clearer, more productive day. However, do you ever actually disinfect items like your desk, keyboard, and mouse?
According to the National Center for Health Research, the standard desk has 400 times more bacteria than the average toilet seat! Plus, we type on our keyboards and touch our mice all day, effectively transferring whatever’s already on our hands to our office tools.
It’s best to sanitize any electronics at least once per week and disinfect your desk to work with a clean frame of mind.
4. Kitchen Sponges
I don’t know about you, but kitchen sponges have always grossed me out. And according to a study conducted by the National Sanitation Foundation, my disdain for this common household object isn’t unfounded.
The study ranked dish sponges as one of the dirtiest items in the home, and they can contain up to 45 billion microbes of bacteria per cubic centimeter. Toilet seats pale in comparison, with a mere average of 3.2 million microbes per square inch.
Sponges are extremely porous, which is why they’re able to harbor more germs. You can clean them in the microwave or run them through the dishwasher.
