ARE WE MAKING OURSELVES SICK or are we being hygienic?
This is a good question and one that will illicit any number of answers. In this age of MRSA, C Diff. and any number of antibiotic resistant bacteria, one wonders if we are going too far down the hygienic road.
I played in the dirt as a kid, it didn’t kill me and yes, god forbid, I even ate an apple without washing it first. The human body has evolved in a natural environment, are we divorcing it from this environment to too great an extreme? We want to work in a sterile environment with no odours, hygienic soap dispensers everywhere, and disinfected desks. We want sterilized phones, cups, tissue and chairs. We go to the doctor and get a vaccine for everything from the flu to it seems anything else, some of the vaccines or pills with worse side effects than the malady that they are to protect us from.
Let us be careful how we proceed in the future, how far we go down the sterile road.
Cleanliness, of course, common sense protection from disease, of course, but beware of excessive and improper use of disinfectants and sterilization. Lest some day in the not so distant future we find ourselves gasping our last breaths after venturing outside on a warm , sunny, spring day only to find that the sweet smell of a cherry blossom does us in like the invading Aliens in War of the Worlds. Go outside and play in the dirt, it won’t kill you. Just don’t eat the yellow snow.