Toilet seats get a bum rap

As your mother constantly warned, "Never touch a public toilet seat! It's filthy! You'll catch something!"

Turns out Mom was a bit alarmist.

"Honestly, toilet seats get a pretty bad rap," said infectious-disease expert Dr. Richard Olds.

Toilet seats in public bathrooms aren't nearly as germ-laden as you'd think. It's difficult to "catch something" off them — the vast majority of contagions can't live on the surface.

But that doesn't hinder companies from working to assuage public-toilet fears, which seethe during busy outdoor summer months. There are myriad creative products to clean or disinfect or cover toilet seats. There's even a personal, portable seat.

It's a huge market and growing, according to the International Sanitary Supply Association in Lincolnwood, Ill. The association reports that money spent on paper toilet-seat liners and trash bags for public bathrooms around the world has increased from $1.2 billion in 1995, to $1.4 billion in 1998 and $2 billion in 2001.

Hands are the real culprits

Olds, chairman of medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, is an expert on parasitic infections and infectious diseases in travelers, who most often use public toilets.

Dirty toilets aren't the issue, Olds said: "The two major problems when you travel are no paper, and no opportunity to wash your hands" after using the toilet.

"You probably run a bigger risk of getting a disease from the doorknob of a bathroom," he added, because people's hands — not backsides — transmit many germs.

Charles Ebel agreed. "Generally toilet seats are not an issue when dealing with the microbes or pathogens of sexually transmitted diseases," said Ebel, senior director of program development for the American Social Health Association.

The nonprofit, based in Research Triangle Park, N.C., works to stop the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, which some people still mistakenly believe are contagious through toilet seats.

Take genital herpes, the most prevalent STD in America. Ebel said transmission is by sexual contact, or skin-to-skin contact on virus lesions, or through mucous membranes — not toilet seats.

Granted, public toilets aren't totally innocent. Olds said one unpleasant problem is pubic lice also known as crabs. "Those are basically free-living organisms you can see with the naked eye," he added.

So if you see them, don't use that seat. Simple.

But it's the idea of public toilet seats that bothers most people. The thought that with all those people using the seat, there's bound to be something evil lurking there.

"People really do take public restrooms personally," said Dan Crawley, spokesman for the second annual America's Best Restroom Award, sponsored by the uniform company Cintas.

So far more than 5,000 Americans have been surveyed in person and on the Internet about public bathrooms as part of the ongoing award program, Crawley said.

A national obsession

America is the nation most likely to fret over public toilets, said Eva Newman of Oakland, Calif., author of "Going Abroad: The Bathroom Survival Guide."

"Some of the toilets I've seen overseas would make you squirm a bit, but the locals don't seem to mind," said Newman, who travels extensively.

Newman said Americans don't seem to realize that "most of the world squats instead of sits down." Squat toilets consist of a hole in the ground with footrests on either side. Thus, no contact with that scary seat.

But while much of the rest of the world squats, Americans still worry about the minuscule chance of contracting disease from a toilet seat.

And companies are happy to help out:

• The Hygolet automatically rotates a new plastic cover around the seat after use.

• The SitSecure dispenser offers users a supply of Viraguard Toilet Seat Wipes (effective, it claims, even against tuberculosis germs).

• CleanSleeve's "unique sleeve design slips on to entirely cover any U-shaped toilet seat without you ever having to touch the seat ... to protect you and your family against the generally unknown sanitary condition of toilet seats found in public restrooms."

• The entire SCS CleanSeat actually twirls through a liquid "hygiene sluice" so "the seat is spotless and utterly hygienically cleaned."

• Perhaps the ultimate in clean-seat technology is Hygen-A-Seat, a portable, folding plastic toilet seat that zips up into its own germ-tight envelope. It comes in eight colors, each $19.95; a shoulder carrying case is available for $9.95.

Inventor Phillip Schneider of Davison, Mich., has been perfecting the design since 1965, when he first got the idea on a camping trip.

"I saw a man with a wooden toilet seat cut in two, with metal hinges and window handles," Schneider said.

"He told me his family didn't like to use the public toilet unless there was something else to sit on."

Schneider now has three patents on his Hygen-A-Seat. He's marketing it on the Internet (www.hygen-a-seat.com/hygenaseat/default.htm) and catalogs, and Target stores have expressed "tentative" interest.

The Hygen-A-Seat motto: "If you don't touch it, you can't catch it."