Is it safe to wash your anus with water and your (ungloved) hand after pooping, assuming (of course) that you don’t touch anything with your hand until you wash it with soap and water?
I’m currently traveling in India. It’s common here, instead of using toilet paper after deification, to pour water down your back and use your left hand to wipe your anus clean of feces. I googled to find information from medical professionals to understand if this is safe or not, but I (surprisingly) couldn’t find any information on the Internet about this.
Of course, let’s assume that we’re doing this properly:
- You only use one hand (typically your left hand), so feces only contaminates one hand.
- You don’t touch anything in the bathroom (eg pitcher, faucet, door knob, etc) with your soiled left hand until after you wash your hands
- You wash your hands properly, following best-practices: using soap and water, scrubbing vigorously for at least 20 seconds.
I’m less interested in your personal opinion, and more interested if any studies have been done analyzing the efficacy of safety in this scenario, using a proper scientific study.
Have any studies been done to analyze if it’s safe to wipe your ass with your hand (and wash your hands properly with soap and water after)?
As long as you wash your hands thoroughly afterwards, you’ll be fine. I use a bidet and even with that, I still wash with my hand using soap. Feels so much cleaner than just blasting with water. It’s no different from washing your ass while in the shower. I recommend you dab a little bit of soap on your hand before you wash, so you clean as you go. Then wash your hands with soap and water thoroughly after.
Ok, so purely logically speaking. With that much poop on your hand you would have to have a relatively deep sink so you don’t splash poop water. You would have to wash your hands for more than 20 seconds and scrub under your fingernails. You should probably use an antiseptic soap. Wash up to your elbow in a deep sink that doesn’t allow for splashing of water. Make sure to scrub soapy water under and around your fingernails very well. You would essentially have to do a pre-surgery hand washing.
Biggest safety hazard I would say would probably be to other people. Not cleaning up afterwards well enough would probably be pretty common. People here in the United States and normal modern bathrooms regularly don’t wash their hands it’s a pretty big leap to assume everyone is being sanitary with this practice.
Could it be a sanitary practice, probably. Is it a sanitary practice, probably not.
people don’t use their hand when using a bidet? Gross! How do they know it’s clean if they don’t wipe?
Personally when I use a bidet I use a small bit of toilet paper to dry. That’s sufficient to tell me that I’m clean. And I’m happy to say I don’t get poop on my hand.
Lol I like how you said not looking for an opinion but had your own, not trying to knock you, but this sort of thing is always gonna have an opinion.
See also The Effect of Handwashing with Water or Soap on Bacterial Contamination of Hands by Maxine Burton, Emma Cobb, Peter Donachie, Gaby Judah, Val Curtis, and Wolf-Peter Schmidt (Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine)
Why wouldn’t it be? As long as you really clean it properly with soap and water afterward.
I wouldn’t do it, just because its gross though.
Does it depend on the soap? Is normal (non-antibacterial) soap sufficient in this situation?
Anti bacterial soap isn’t really necessary.
“There’s no data demonstrating that these drugs provide additional protection from diseases and infections. Using these products might give people a false sense of security,” Michele says. “If you use these products because you think they protect you more than soap and water, that’s not correct. If you use them because of how they feel, there are many other products that have similar formulations but won’t expose your family to unnecessary chemicals. And some manufacturers have begun to revise these products to remove these ingredients.”
