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The Nairobian

Do you use your phone when you're sitting on the toilet? This is why it's a really bad idea

World

By Mirror | Mar 31, 2016

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 .

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.

Aside from the obvious danger of accidentally dropping your 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.

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Nope.

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 faecal matter.

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 dirty toilet water coating literally everything — especially the toilet paper dispenser, because it’s right next to the toilet bowl."

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.