Health

Why You Need to De-Germ Your Gym Bag ASAP

Working out may be good for your health, but the icky pathogens that you're bringing home definitely are not

by Allie Flinn | 1 COMMENT

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Avoiding illness at the gym is a bit like driving defensively: You need to anticipate that other people will make mistakes, leading to dangerous (read: germ-y) situations. But while most of your attention is focused on the germ-ridden elliptical machines and free weights, you're completely overlooking a sneaky, disease-harboring source: your gym bag.

"Eighty percent of all infectious disease is transmitted by contact," says Dr. Philip Tierno, Jr., professor of microbiology and pathology at the NYU School of Medicine. That can be from either direct contact or indirect contact (like picking up your gym bag and them touching your eyes, nose or mouth).

"Where there are people, people impart their germs. And that's where you get the pathogens," Tierno says. "With a little caution and awareness of how we spread germs, I think you can break the transmission." Translation: It's time to grab your gym bag and start scrubbing. Here, the germiest items hiding in your gym bag, and the nasty pathogens that have taken up residence.

SEE NEXT PAGE: Your Towel: A Magnet for HPV and E. Coli

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