Bleach use around the home!

[dottiedodah]

Bit boring I know.But just that really ,how often do you bleach loo?.I do every night, and sometimes during day as well. Also use it for cleaning sinks and soaking items .My DS thinks my use is a bit excessive .and could be harming the enviroment .Any thoughts?

@formerbabe

Interestingly in my family we just don't get tummy bugs.

Either my non bleach cleaners do their job or we have a good immunity, maybe because we don't use bleach...

Stomach bugs? Maybe we’ve been lucky but I can count on the fingers of two hands the stomach bugs we’ve had at over the last 20 years and we’ve never had one pass from one member of the family to another. We don’t use bleach and just clean normally during and after the few bugs we’ve had. Even when the DCs were in nursery they never had stomach bugs. It would be the fingers of one hand if it wasn’t for DH who seems to get a stomach bug every time we go on holiday, which is a bit of a family joke. All over in a day though, so not serious.

@smashamasha interesting because my family don't get stomach bugs either and I'm a bleach lover. Proves being clean doesn't do you any harm.

@Blitheringheights I can only go by people I know and things I've heard. Not many people I know have died young unless it's been in a car crash/ fight ect. My cousin died at 21 but he had ms and I don't think he's Mother's bleach did that to him. Others have died at old age.

Anyway this debate won't change my opinion. I will carry on using the stuff and so will my kids 🤷🏻‍♀️

@teenmum18

But they will be at higher risk of the other things that bleach and similar cleaners can cause.

Not using bleach doesn't mean a house is dirty. It just means they don't use bleach.

I don't believe for a second people saying their households don't suffer from tummy bugs and diarrhea - that no one has never eaten badly prepared food or drunk too much fluids.

We're a child free household and I can't remember us having bad stomach bugs ever. The very infrequent minor upsets resolve despite not using bleach.

I think people that willingly fill their living environments with toxic chemicals are mad.

@Laurajjj I've had norovirus once, that's it and I'm 34. Not prone to them, I'm more likely to get tonsillitis/lose my voice/get a chest infection

#formerbabe we've been lucky that we've only ever had a stomach bug hit us twice (kids are 9, 7 and 3). I cleaned affected areas with disinfectant, was careful with bedding and towels, and made sure we all washed our hands properly.

I don't object to bleach in this instance although I chose not to use it as it foams up too much.

I've had the same bottle in my cupboard for 6 years! 😂

Several points to answer.

Bleach is not just a salt, if you are meaning ‘table salt’, sodium chloride (NaCl). It is a different substance (Mainly Na0Cl).

It’s not intuitive to me to chuck something that worsens my asthma down the loo.

I don’t use aerosols or perfume. And I haven't for years.

We've been lucky enough never to have had a sickness bug that we've passed around the family apart from once, when we were away. Clearly our standards of hygiene don't make us ill.

To the person who questioned the health of travellers, unfortunately it's a statistical fact that travellers have some of the worst health outcomes in the country. It's known as health inequality. I can't comment about what influence cleaning methods have, but discrimination and poor access to health services play a part in this. Sadly society as a whole is very bigoted against travellers and there are many stories of them being turned away when they attempt to access health services. I once was involved in setting up an outreach service to travellers to help reduce these health inequalities. It's a long term project.

Laurajjj your not believing we don’t get regular stomach bugs doesn’t change the fact that we don’t. Why would I lie about such a trivial thing?

Because children inparticular alaways pick up tummy bugs from school, and at some time or other most people have a dodgy piece of food from a restaurant or dining out, and dare I say it from a few beers and a kebab on a night out.

No stomach bugs in this household for over a decade-we are very robust and no DC to bring germs yet. This may change from Sept! But we’d just do sensible cleaning if it happens.

We do minimal cleaning rest of the time, exposure to germs is a good thing. I am good friends with an eminent professor of microbiology (I work in HE), she doesn’t use bleach or excessively use other cleaning products - and her family don’t get ill either.

Domestic toilets are generally very clean places, if you want to find proper nasties look under/around kitchen taps/sinks and tea towels. That’s where a lot of illnesses will be coming from, a swab of those areas in a lot of houses will grow some alarming things!
I’d rather lick a toilet seat than a kitchen tap that’s for sure.

I've had 3 stomach bugs in the last year. I still don't use bleach much. I only really use it after a stomach bug.

don't believe for a second people saying their households don't suffer from tummy bugs and diarrhea - that no one has never eaten badly prepared food or drunk too much fluids

None here either for a decade, my DH hasn't thrown up for at least 18 years, no bleach here. Anyhow, eating a dodgy kebab has bugger all to do with how clean you keep your loo.

Oh and I've got 3 DC's, teenagers now. I know you won't believe me but honest to God they've both only been sick once (as in vomit) and that was many years ago .

Ok I’ll say it slowly. My Children Were Not. Prone To Stomach Bugs. I can’t change that reality just because you don’t believe it.

One of them did have a spectacular bout of d&v when she was about 6. Otherwise nothing, no missed school or nursery due to stomach bugs. I wouldn’t count vomiting due to excessive alcohol either because that is not a bug, not that that is a regular occurrence. I would not eat a dodgy kebab or eat somewhere that looked dodgy but I do eat oysters and seafood regularly.

Anyhow, eating a dodgy kebab has bugger all to do with how clean you keep your loo

I agree. I was just genuinely intrigued that no one literally ever has a diarrhea or sickness in a household even if it is a drink or dodgy food induced bout.

The last stomach bug in our house was about 2011 after we went to a an indoor play area I remember it because I was so sick and I never get sick.My kids are 19 and 20 now .We have never had food poisoning either..ever and have been all over the world.The kids have vomited from alcohol though.

Laurajjj I know, honestly it's weird! We're obviously just not prone. I can count on one hand between 5 of us in 27 years how often anyone has been sick and never simultaneously.

But isn't it connected though? The whole point is to keep your system able to deal with a certain amount of good/bad/indifferent bacteria so that your immune system stays strong and can fend off sickness/bugs/food poisoning? I thought most of the food poisoning that happened when travelling was because of not being used to the local microbes.

We very, very rarely get sick and on the two occasions i can think of since i had kids just clean up afterwards with normal method or ecover or even good old plain soap and hot water.

Getting kids outside to get really muddy and basically roll around on grass is also important.

I am really quite clean, but since i grew up with a hyper clean mother, and have several auto-immune issues plus allergies, it's very possible that I am more aware of all this than the average person. It also took me quite a long time to get over having to be 'respectable wee woman' levels of clean.

I’m obsessed with bleach, I love the smell. To me the smell of bleach = a clean home. I bleach my sinks and toilets every day.

As a household we've had 3 stomach bugs in the last 10 years. All norovirus. Once me, once DH and once me and DS, but that was because he was 8 months old and chucking up all over me, so I caught it (he caught it off a kid at a baby group).

No bleach needed, just good cleaning. Just because we don't use bleach doesn't mean the germs spread, or that they don't get cleaned away!

pink it smells vile, when I smell it on other people I really do move away from them.

If I went into someone’s home and it smelt of bleach, I wouldn’t think it smelt clean, I’d assume they’d had a sickness bug or a let had shat on the floor somewhere!

• pet not let