Northern folk are officially dirtier than southerners, according to new research

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The Living Force
http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5gJyyKbN_cXwe7U85hdPR96LI37Ug

Northern folk 'dirtier'

Northern folk are officially dirtier than southerners, according to new research.

A study found that the hands of people from the north of England were up to three times more likely to be contaminated with toilet bugs.

Scientists were astonished to find that hand hygiene worsened with every step taken further north.

Hands were cleanest in London, dirtier in Birmingham and Cardiff, and filthiest in Liverpool and Newcastle.

The most likely explanation is that fewer northerners are washing their hands with soap after answering the call of nature, say researchers.

It was chiefly men who were responsible for the trend - but in Cardiff and London, women were the dirtiest sex. In total, almost 30% of people tested were carrying "faecal" bacteria.

Dr Val Curtis, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who led the study, said: "We were flabbergasted by the finding that so many people had faecal bugs on their hands.

"The figures were far higher than we had anticipated, and suggest that there is a real problem with people washing their hands in the UK. If any of these people had been suffering from diarrhoea disease, the potential for it to be passed around would be greatly increased by their failure to wash their hands after going to the toilet."

Dr Curtis's team took random swabs from the hands of 409 commuters waiting at bus stops near London Euston, Birmingham New Street, Cardiff Central, Liverpool Lime Street and Newcastle Central stations on weekday mornings.

When they were analysed, 113 of the samples were found to contain bacteria from faeces.The most common bugs were Enterococci, present in 22% of samples, followed by Escherichia coli (9%). Both live in the gut and are generally harmless, but discovering them on people's hands is worrying, say the researchers.
 
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