By Ted Handy – Special to Suburban Wisdom

LODI, CA –A recent report in Germs Weekly delivered some disturbing results regarding people’s hygiene habits, according to Dr. Linda Pennington, Associate Professor of Microbiology at Lodi State University.

“To say that many people live and act like pigs would, essentially, be a horrible insult to pigs,” said Pennington, regarding hygiene habits. “The results of the study were at once disturbing, foul and, quite frankly, repulsive.”

Among the findings in the Hygiene Habits study were habits of regularly not making beds, rarely changing – and often reusing – soiled underpants and smelling one’s own fingers after scratching their anus and/or private area.

And these were some of the tamer findings.

“What people do when they think no one is looking is truly atrocious,” continued Pennington. “It definitely makes you reconsider participating in many everyday activities such as shaking hands or using an ATM. And eating out? Never again! The receptacles containing condiments such as salt, pepper, ketchup and Tobasco Sauce on your standard restaurant table are so rife with filth, they may as well be smeared with human excrement. ”

In the double-blind study of 5,000 diverse 18-54 year old men and women, daily hygienic habits were broken down into several categories focusing on personal, social and home behaviors. Other findings include:

• 94% of men regularly drip pee on the floor and surrounding area in both public and private restrooms. Women? An off-putting 96%. The other 6% and 4%, respectively, reported diligently cleaning up after themselves or avoiding any dripping in the first place.
• 89% admitted to having wiped “boogers” on furniture and carpets of homes where they were guests. This same group also acknowledged wiping their soiled hands on shirts, pants, carpets and virtually any other fabric-type surface following a wet sneeze.
• 83% confessed to regularly peeing in the shower, even at a public gym, while common routines involving both the discarding, and failure to discard, feminine napkins and other feminine hygiene products are beyond the scope of what can be printed here.
• A final eye-opener: 73% of participants felt it was “okay” to fart in an elevator or other public setting as long as it was “quiet”.

“Some people may mock germaphobes, but they do so at their own peril,” said Pennington. “If people really saw behind the curtain of human hygienic habits, their skin would crawl and they’d probably throw-up.”