A news reporter in Florida had an unpleasant realization when sitting in the parking lot at his local grocery store. He watched as birds landed and defecated on shopping carts and had the disturbing feeling the germs from bird droppings are probably not the only thing leaving bacteria on the handles. Used by countless people each day, the idea that bacteria are being passed hand to hand piqued his curiosity, so he decided to do some tests to find out just how much bacteria were left behind. It wasn’t good news.
Tested Shopping Carts At 10 Shops
Jeff Weinsier, an investigative reporter with Live 10 News, swabbed the handles of shopping carts at 10 different locations in the South Florida area. He obtained a kit from Kappa Labs and traveled from Davie to Coral Gables and Liberty City to Winchester collecting his samples. He discovered seven of the 10 samples showed surprisingly high levels of bacteria.
“I think that the sheer numbers were a surprise,” said Dr. Peter Kmieck of Kappa Labs.
Shopping Cart Bacteria In The Billions
Of the seven that showed bacteria, three were beyond scary in their levels. We’re talking hundreds of billions in one case. The top three plate counts ranged from 16.3 billion to 277.6 billion. The remaining were in the thousands.
Weinsier told Dr. Kmieck the findings were scary, and Kmieck agreed. The tests looked at the presence of aerobic, mesophilic organisms that survive and grow between 20 to 45 degrees Celsius which would include yeast, bacteria, fungi, and molds.
Shopping Cart Counts As High As Sewage
“We generally do not see this high of a count unless we are dealing with things like raw sewage,” says Dr. Kmieck.
Dr. Robert Smith from Nova Southeastern University also reviewed the results. As an associate professor of Biological Science, he agreed that it is a lot of bacteria. “Some forms of strep throat will be caused by bacteria,” he says. “They picked up a bacteria called pseudomonas. It can also cause infections.”
Kids In Shopping Carts
As part of his report, Weinsier spent 30 minutes watching people entering a Hollywood Publix store. Mothers were using shopping carts with their kids in the seat without taking the time to wipe the handles down. Of course, this is probably very common, I would imagine. Most moms don’t have the time to think of such things. In fact, one parent Weinsier spoke to said, “I was just running in and out.”
Sanitizing Wipes For Shopping Carts
He also counted only six out of 22 people who entered the store even bothered to help themselves to free sanitizing wipes at the door. Not a single person he watched grab a basket used a wipe first. “You would expect there to be a significant amount of transfer from the handle to the hand,” says Kmieck.
If it seems a waste of time to use wipes to clean off a shopping cart handle, consider what Weinsier found when he did wipe the handle before taking a sample. That simple step that only took seconds did in fact remove the bacteria. “This just wiped all the bacteria present,” said Kmieck.
Higher Bacteria Count On Sundays
Something to keep in mind: the handles with the highest count of bacteria were taken on a Sunday following the busiest time of the week for shopping, while lower counts were taken on Monday. And although you might be worried about shopping at a Publix, the problem is not related to this specific chain. “There is really no one store that is going to be worse than another,” said Smith. And remember, Publix provided the free wipes!
If you’re feeling foolish that you don’t use wipes on your shopping carts, you obviously are not the exception. In fact, even Dr. Kmieck who works in a lab doesn’t use the wipes. After this little test he admits, “I will definitely wipe the handle of the cart.” And so will I!
