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[aaronjb]

Always makes me smile that there are notices in toilets saying "now wash your hands" and then you have to pull a door handle to get out which someone before you has pulled without washing their hands first.

I remember having some visitors at work over from the US - they were appalled that there was no paper-towel dispenser and accompanying bin within reach of the door, to allow them to open the door with a paper towel and discard it as they exited the bathrooms..

[Lizzie Zoom]

At work and when mixing with people, like at the pub, shopping and socializing, we are much more prone to picking up illnesses, where people carry on and spread their illnesses around them. Women like Lizzie are much more prone to spreading their illnesses whereas us men, do the decent thing by not spreading the germs, where we are all tucked in bed unable to move from man flu.

When you have children you have even more so illnesses as schools are a giant breeding area for germs and children only clean their hands when they have an evening bath or shower and that is only due to being in the unliked vicinity of clean water.

Very true.  But it has only become a problem in modern times.  As others have touched on, it was not so long ago when we as kids were a lot tougher and seemingly resistant to so much of the minor illnesses compared to today. I am not forgetting the very serious illnesses of those days, but I cannot remember getting much in the way of food poisoning and hay fever was a rarity, with flue generally not as widespread and frequent as today: is this a false memory as the great flue epidemic of 1918 was worse than anything now?? But as individuals were we ill as much?

We used outside toilets without any washing facilities, apart from  the inside kitchen sink cold tap, if you remembered, and only washed in the bath once a week. There was little bleach, and certainly no "anti-septic" surface cleaners used which seem to not have existed then. Disposable tissues were not regularly used, with instead linen handkerchiefs repeatedly filled with gems and stored long term with goodness knows what breeding in men's trouser pockets or women's handbags! General hygiene everywhere you went was nothing up to the standards of today.

No, our soft, fitted carpeted, centrally heated, "sterile" homes have a lot to answer for and negated some of the advantages of being super clean: possibly too clean as the old dirt of the past, coupled with cold homes, actually protected us in a peculiar way!

[Sir Tigger KC]

One thing with kids that I've noticed, is that hair nits seem to be much more common than I remember as a kid. 

[Bigron]

Lizzie, you have it spot on! Without the challenge of everyday exposure to threats, our immune systems have nothing to work on, so go bye-byes, leaving us prone to real infection should it come along.
Look at how resistant to disease the not-very-clean French are!

Ron.

[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

At work and when mixing with people, like at the pub, shopping and socializing, we are much more prone to picking up illnesses, where people carry on and spread their illnesses around them. Women like Lizzie are much more prone to spreading their illnesses whereas us men, do the decent thing by not spreading the germs, where we are all tucked in bed unable to move from man flu.

When you have children you have even more so illnesses as schools are a giant breeding area for germs and children only clean their hands when they have an evening bath or shower and that is only due to being in the unliked vicinity of clean water.

Very true.  But it has only become a problem in modern times.  As others have touched on, it was not so long ago when we as kids were a lot tougher and seemingly resistant to so much of the minor illnesses compared to today. I am not forgetting the very serious illnesses of those days, but I cannot remember getting much in the way of food poisoning and hay fever was a rarity, with flue generally not as widespread and frequent as today: is this a false memory as the great flue epidemic of 1918 was worse than anything now?? But as individuals were we ill as much?

We used outside toilets without any washing facilities, apart from  the inside kitchen sink cold tap, if you remembered, and only washed in the bath once a week. There was little bleach, and certainly no "anti-septic" surface cleaners used which seem to not have existed then. Disposable tissues were not regularly used, with instead linen handkerchiefs repeatedly filled with gems and stored long term with goodness knows what breeding in men's trouser pockets or women's handbags! General hygiene everywhere you went was nothing up to the standards of today.

No, our soft, fitted carpeted, centrally heated, "sterile" homes have a lot to answer for and negated some of the advantages of being super clean: possibly too clean as the old dirt of the past, coupled with cold homes, actually protected us in a peculiar way!

Yep....in effect the modern immune system has closed down. In the good old filthy rat infested days our immune systems had to work for a living.

[ronnyd]

My old Gran used to say that you have to eat a peck of dirt before you die.

[Lizzie Zoom]

[quote  author=ronnyd link=topic=141029.msg1829195#msg1829195 date=1508352272]
My old Gran used to say that you have to eat a peck of dirt before you die.
[/quote]

When I was four I remember making cakes out of mud in the garden and doing my damnest to eat them.  My mum, after a few occasions of me doing that just said "you don't want to do that, come inside and I'll teach you to cook" which she started to do.  Imagine what mothers today would do?  They would go bananas and rush their kid to the doctors!!  We eat so much dirt everywhere we went in the 1950's!

[TheBoy]

I think office environments, with circulating air-con and such means you get exposed to more that you would if not working.

There are over 10,000 people on site here, with around 2,500 in the building I'm in. That alone means more cold and sniffles floating around!

Just that proximity with the great unwashed - this problem existed long before most offices got their environmental controls.

You're sharing space with 2,500 eedjits who bring in germs caught from their bastard, mongrel kids.

[BazaJT]

Well it keeps a roof over my head and food on the table so it can't be all bad.Having worked outdoors for the biggest part of the time for the last 32yrs,I tend[touch wood]to not suffer too badly.

[Lizzie Zoom]

Of course it must be spelt out that we in the UK / Western developed World have never had it so good in medical terms.  Our life expectancy has gone up through the roof compared to the 19th century, when in some areas of Britain you in the working class were lucky to reach 40 years of age.  Then 150 in every 1000 births saw the infants, if lucky enough to survive birth, along with the mother, die before the age of 5. Today that is 5 that die in every 1000 before they are 5, although apparently that is the worst rate in Europe!!

The medical advances have been huge and made all the difference, along with a lack of epidemics, plagues and World war. Our air has never been cleaner, our water never so pure, our drainage never so well managed, and our fresh vegetables never so readily available. Our doctors have never before been so good at detecting major illnesses, and are more equipped to deal with them than ever before, with survival rates at their highest. Why are the surgeries so full of patients now? It is because the modern generation (especially men) have never before been so willing to see a doctor as they are far better educated about what can potentially go wrong with the human body, thanks to the TV, the media generally, and the Internet along with all the social sites. Hence the NHS being expected to carryout ever more treatments, some at extortionate costs, when in the past patients would have just lingered on until death.

The only black cloud is of course the declining ability of the anti-biotics to be effective, and the threat of Armageddon.  That could be very bad / terminal for our health! 

In all though we have never had it so good!
 

[Bigron]

Of course it must be spelt out that we in the UK / Western developed World have never had it so good in medical terms.  Our life expectancy has gone up through the roof compared to the 19th century, when in some areas of Britain you in the working class were lucky to reach 40 years of age.  Then 150 in every 1000 births saw the infants, if lucky enough to survive birth, along with the mother, die before the age of 5. Today that is 5 that die in every 1000 before they are 5, although apparently that is the worst rate in Europe!!

The medical advances have been huge and made all the difference, along with a lack of epidemics, plagues and World war. Our air has never been cleaner, our water never so pure, our drainage never so well managed, and our fresh vegetables never so readily available. Our doctors have never before been so good at detecting major illnesses, and are more equipped to deal with them than ever before, with survival rates at their highest. Why are the surgeries so full of patients now? It is because the modern generation (especially men) have never before been so willing to see a doctor as they are far better educated about what can potentially go wrong with the human body, thanks to the TV, the media generally, and the Internet along with all the social sites. Hence the NHS being expected to carryout ever more treatments, some at extortionate costs, when in the past patients would have just lingered on until death.

The only black cloud is of course the declining ability of the anti-biotics to be effective, and the threat of Armageddon.  That could be very bad / terminal for our health! 

In all though we have never had it so good!

Yes, that could be part of the reason, but also a greater feeling of entitlement - and of course, Health Tourism. All the immigrants, usually short term, who want to freeload off our system. 

Ron.

[Migv6 le Frog Fan]

When I was 4 I was caught eating worms in the garden. A short time later I tried eating fresh tarmac off the road. Then I drank a bottle of windolene, which required stomach pumping, then there was the bottle of Harpic - anyone remember it ? a powder containing caustic soda among other things. I thought it was the same as sherbet. This required stomach pumping again.
Not sure if I was malnourished or just fackin backward, but these days I would probably be in foster care, or a home for the junior bewildereds. 
When I was 5 I had my first TWOC, in Dads car, but that's another story. 

Anyway, all that dirt etc. didn't really keep me immune from disease, as I had rheumatic fever by the time I was 8 years old, which kind of ruined my schooling forever. Although parents moving house every 2 or 3 years cant have helped in that department. 

[Kevin Wood]

When I was four I remember making cakes out of mud in the garden and doing my damnest to eat them.  My mum, after a few occasions of me doing that just said "you don't want to do that, come inside and I'll teach you to cook" which she started to do.  Imagine what mothers today would do?  They would go bananas and rush their kid to the doctors!!  We eat so much dirt everywhere we went in the 1950's!

This is very true. They'd pull a face like when I mentioned to my sister-in-law (clean freak) that the cats use the area of bark chippings under my nephew's slide as kitty litter.

[zirk]

When I was 4 1 was caught eating worms in the garden. A short time later I tried eating fresh tarmac off the road. Then I drank a bottle of windolene, which required stomach pumping, then there was the bottle of Harpic - anyone remember it ? a powder containing caustic soda among other things. I thought it was the same as sherbet. This required stomach pumping again.
Not sure if I was malnourished or just fackin backward, but these days I would probably be in foster care, or a home for the junior bewildereds. 
When I was 5 1 had my first TWOC, in Dads car, but that's another story. 

Anyway, all that dirt etc. didn't really keep me immune from disease, as I had rheumatic fever by the time I was 8 years old, which kind of ruined my schooling forever. Although parents moving house every 2 or 3 years cant have helped in that department. 

So you did all this at 41 and you still didn't learn your lesson at 51.

[ronnyd]

When I was 4 I was caught eating worms in the garden. A short time later I tried eating fresh tarmac off the road. Then I drank a bottle of windolene, which required stomach pumping, then there was the bottle of Harpic - anyone remember it ? a powder containing caustic soda among other things. I thought it was the same as sherbet. This required stomach pumping again.
Not sure if I was malnourished or just fackin backward, but these days I would probably be in foster care, or a home for the junior bewildereds. 
When I was 5 I had my first TWOC, in Dads car, but that's another story. 

Anyway, all that dirt etc. didn't really keep me immune from disease, as I had rheumatic fever by the time I was 8 years old, which kind of ruined my schooling forever. Although parents moving house every 2 or 3 years cant have helped in that department. 

You must have had long legs for a five year old.