”Sanitation, when taken too far, can cause diversity of microbes to collapse. For example; Thoroughly scrubbed toilets are first colonised by faecal microbes, which are launched into the air by roiling, flushed water. Those species are eventually outcompeted by a diverse range of skin microbes, but once the toilet gets scrubbed again, the communities go back to square one. So, here’s the irony: toilets that are cleaned too often are more likely to be covered in faecal bacteria”.
”A similar pattern was found among the microbes that float inside air-conditioned hospital rooms. Outdoors, the air is full of harmless microbes from plants and soils. Indoors, it contained a disproportionate number of potential pathogens, which are normally rare or absent in the outside world, but had been launched from the mouths and skins of hospital residents. The patients were effectively stewing in their own microbial juices. And the best way of fixing that was remarkably simple: open a window”.
”Fresh air brings in harmless environmental microbes that take up space and exclude pathogens. But the idea of deliberately inviting microbes into a room deeply contradicts our assumptions about how hospitals should work”.
Excerpt from the book; I contain mulititude by Ed Yong
Microbes are our friends. Keep things tidy and neat but no need to obsess about cleanliness.
