Why you should never, ever use a hotel hairdryer

Nobody ever wants to be packing unnecessary items when going on holiday.

Apart from the right amount of clothes and essentials like a toothbrush, deodorant, money and a mobile phone, other things can be left behind.

After all, most hotels provide shower gel, shampoo and irons nowadays leaving us with more space in our suitcase.

One thing that people rarely ever pack is a hairdryer as they can be really bulky, but research suggests that could be an unhealthy error.

A 2008 study conducted by Microbiologist Chuck Gerba, who is an expert in germs, found that a hotel hairdryer should be avoided if you can.

American news network ABCasked him to look into the cleanliness of nine hotel rooms in Los Angeles, ranging from three to five stars.

Bizarrely, he discovered that hotel hairdryers were one of the dirtiest items in the room and it wasn't because they were blowing out germs.

No, it's actually because cleaning hairdryers isn't a compulsory task for hotel cleaners, who have to sanitise things like the toilet and drinking utensils.

He said:

There must be some things you can do with a hair dryer that I am not aware of because some of them were pretty germy.

This means that other objects in the room like light switches, remote controls, keys and menus, which are regularly used by other people could be carrying all sorts of germs.

Gerba added some advice for hotel cleaners:

You have to be very careful in the use of your disinfectants, your cleaning tools, and where you wipe and what you wipe so you don't really move germs around.
You don't want to give them a free ride around the hotel room.

No matter the hotel, Gerba found traces of germs in every room with one location said to be containing fecal coliform and MRSA which can cause serious skin infections.

So next time you are going away, consider taking a hair dryer with you.

HT ABC The Sun

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