Do You Use Your Phone When You're Sitting On The Toilet? This Is Why It's A Really Bad Idea

#1

Sitting on the toilet is dead time. And while the accompanying activity of choice used to be reading a book or a newspaper, most people now opt for their smartphone

#2 Bad. Bad. Bad. Don't do it.

Why? Because our phones come everywhere with us. So if you've got a few minutes of boredom, then it's only natural to resort to checking your WhatsApp messages, football scores or having a go of Flappy Bird.

But apparently it's a REALLY bad idea.

#3 You think your toilet is clean? It might look, but it doesn't mean anything.

Aside from the obvious danger of accidentally dropping a £600 smartphone into a bowl of water, it's also doing damage to our health.

Obviously bathrooms are not the cleanest places in the world - especially public ones, you don't know when they were last cleaned - but you might assume that if the phone is only touching your hands, you're safe.

Nope.

#4

Professors of microbiology, Charles Gerba, Ph.D. and Kelly Reynolds, Ph.D., a professor of environmental health, told BuzzFeed their thoughts on toilet mobile browsing.

They pointed out that bathrooms are covered in germs, pathogens, and bacteria from the intestinal tract - mostly from fecal matter.

#5

Reynolds told BuzzFeed: "When you flush the toilet, water with faeces and urine sprays about six feet in every direction. "And the aerosols increase with every flush, so if it's a public bathroom, there is a dirty toilet water coating literally everything especially the toilet paper dispenser, because it's right next to the toilet bowl."

#6 Nope.. Don't use your phone while sitting on the toilet...

#7 How many germs do you carry with your phone?

Basically, whatever your hand touches in that bathroom - whether it's toilet roll holders, door handles or the flush lever - is going to transmit tiny bits of faeces onto your fingers.

And then when you're swiping left and right through Tinder, you're going to get a very dirty phone...

Where germs go, you can be sure illness will follow.