
Like most of us, presumably, I really dislike hand dryers like these. They’ve been around forever, but most newer restaurants and bars have this type of model, which is called a jet air dryer.

The one that was around when most of us were kids, pictured above, is called a warm air dryer. This distinction may seem trivial, but it’s not.
There are two questions about these things. First, does the method of drying make a difference to the cleanliness of your hands? Second, does one of them spread more viruses and bacteria around than the other?
Here are two studies published in legitimate scientific journals that address these questions. The first was from 2000, where the authors determined that using paper towels, rotary cloth towels, warm air dryers or no drying method at all made no difference in the amount of goo left on hands. The second, from 2015, showed that jet air dryers caused “significantly greater and further dispersal” of goo around the bathroom than warm air dryers.
I’m not a scientist or a doctor, and I’m not trying to tell anyone to stop washing their hands. I’m just saying that when I walk into a restroom with one of those jet dryers, I’m going to be damn careful about my handwashing and about what I touch after I wash hands. And I might use some hand sanitizer after I leave the room.
Speaking of hand sanitizer, lots of the stuff on the market isn’t recommended by the CDC for COVID-19 because it uses benzalkonium chloride as the cleaning agent instead of the recommended 60% alcohol. I was wondering about making my own since apparently people are hoarding it. Here are the WHO guidelines for a simple solution of either 80% or 75% alcohol hand sanitizer. The main ingredient for the 80% version is 96% ethanol, which is basically Everclear. The other ingredients are small amounts of glycerin and hydrogen peroxide.
(By the way, the article that referenced the studies mentioned above completely conflates the two questions I asked here, which goes to show that a lot of science journalism is bad.)
Scuffletuffle
But it’s so much fun to watch my skin ripple and flap in the Dyson…
Cheryl Rofer
I’ve seen a number of studies that say that the jet air dryers splatter everything everywhere. And paper towels have the advantage that you can use them to turn off the water if it’s not an automatic faucet, or touch the door handle.
As to which leave more stuff on your hands, hard to say.
I think that we can also get too worried about getting our hands clean. I don’t know where the cutoff for “too worried” is. Using Everclear in the recipe will be fine, maybe add a dash more.
But alcohol evaporates rather easily, so keep the caps on the bottles tight.
Amir Khalid
Most science journalism is bad. With rare exceptions, it’s reported and edited by journalists with no training in science. (For some reason, those who do have science training prefer to work at sciencing.) They’re not equipped to sort truth from lies or bullshit, so they fall back on the sensational. ‘Tis sad.
Kay (not the front-pager)
I carry a roll of paper towels in my car and tuck a couple in my bag before I go in to use a restroom if I think the will have 1 of those jet dryers. For one thing, I was taught (and current coronavirus guidelines recommend) that you use a paper towel to open the door leaving the bathroom. How ya gonna do that with a jet dryer, huh?
If you don’t have a roll of paper towels in your car (or if you don’t have a car) at least take a handful of paper napkins in with you.
WereBear
No matter what they might say, air dryers are about lower maintenance and product costs.
Noncarborundum
One of my pet peeves is the places (e.g., Dunkin Donuts) where the rest rooms don’t have paper towels, but do have signs on the wall recommending a hand-washing procedure that includes turning off the tap using a paper towel.
download my app in the app store mistermix
You can usually open doors and turn off taps with your elbows if you don’t have a paper towel in the restroom.
JPL
Truthfully when I saw the dow opening, I loudly swore. It’s bad.
Amir Khalid
@Kay (not the front-pager):
Places that provide napkins are quite parsimonious with them nowadays.
MattF
@JPL: Down 1800 points.
Snarki, child of Loki
Unfortunately, all too often the hot-air hand driers have not had their bacon dispensers refilled. False advertising!
https://i.redd.it/j78417hw5q701.jpg
Amir Khalid
@download my app in the app store mistermix:
Every restroom door I have ever encountered opens inwards. That’s fine if you’re entering, but then you can’t elbow the door open if you’re exiting.
Gin & Tonic
@JPL: You made me look. Holy shit!
sam
@Kay (not the front-pager): this is somewhat harder to do in places that are not…eateries.
I went to the Museum of Modern Art yesterday, and it had been renovated last year, so all the bathrooms were super modern and the hand washing “stations” were fully integrated – meaning you didn’t need to touch anything but you stuck your hands under the soap dispenser and then the sink and you could wash your hands, and THEN the same sink automatically started blow drying your hands with the force of chuck yeager.
and then there were zero towels anywhere with which to open the door (I supposed I could have tried to go back and grab some toilet paper, but all the stalls were occupied). I ended up using my scarf.
Scout211
@Kay (not the front-pager):
Thank you for that piece of advice. I will add paper towels to my car, next to the disinfectant wipes and the hand wipes.
We also have washable grocery bags. We’ve used them for many years and have often gotten compliments over the years from clerks in stores who are loading our groceries. I guess the cheaper ones are not really washable and can get nasty.. Now is a good time to launder them regularly.
Gin & Tonic
@Gin & Tonic: Trading halted.
JR
If a Trumper ever tells you again how great their 401k is doing, just send them this chart:
https://www.macrotrends.net/2481/stock-market-performance-by-president
Of course, this is from before today. The market is currently at the same level it was in roughly December 2017.
Fair Economist
I hate jet hand dryers because of the noise. They literally (in the proper sense) make my ears hurt, like a jet engine. I’d rather leave my hands wet. Spewing germs just adds to their awfulness.
Betty Cracker
NYSE halted trading after the Dow cratered 1800 points. Twitler is praising himself and tweet-screaming about fake news. I’m sure everything will be fine.
different-church-lady
“Press button for message from the President.”
oatler.
What’s the bidet situation in Europe right now?
Jeffro
@JR: Wow…no wonder Bill Clinton got re-elected
MisterForkbeard
@JPL: I had been thinking about selling some stock to have a little extra cushion in my finances. Nope.
MisterForkbeard
@Betty Cracker: One of those two things happens every day. I suppose that’s reassuring.
mrmoshpotato
@Kay (not the front-pager):
Blow the door open.
mrmoshpotato
@Snarki, child of Loki: So true, so true. Bastards.
Jeffro
@Betty Cracker: Looking through his tweets and retweets, I see that current COVID-10 quarantine person Paul Gosar actually had the balls to tweet out the following:
Yes, really. Should have seen that one coming. Up is down, down is up, 2+2=5, and it was really THE LIBS who were calling this very serious virus a “hoax”, y’all.
Where. Is. My. Bat?
schrodingers_cat
I hate these stupid dryers. I also hate this time change that we do twice a year, it messes up my sleep cycle. Yes I am cranky why do you ask?
mrmoshpotato
@Betty Cracker: It’s only 10AM and (chef’s kiss).
charluckles
@Fair Economist:
Thank you.
I have a child who is sound sensitive. He will outright refuse to go into bathrooms where those jet dryers are in operation.
mrmoshpotato
@schrodingers_cat: Well, because you seem cranky.
MattF
@Betty Cracker: Limited behavioral repertoire is limited. Behavioral. Repertoire.
mrmoshpotato
@Jeffro: Wood or Aluminum?
Aleta
Maybe that sleeve fashion that covers the hand (kept in place by a thumb hole) will start to sell again (in a utilitarian version). And other imagined virus wear.
Ohio Mom
Yes, the door handles are the most germ-laden fixture in any public bathroom, that’s always been so.
I won’t use a blower, if need be, I will shake my hands and wipe them on my clothes instead (an advantage of dressing in jeans most of the time). Blowers take too long and make my ears ring.
Feathers
I am so tempted to start a Yelp account just to leave one star review for restaurants that do not have coat hooks in the restrooms.
Confession time. If there are no towels I will often shake off the water and then dry my hands on my hair. It’s very thick and use the underside. I wash it daily and very rarely get sick. I’m guessing this is the worst. I grew up in a “you eat a peck of dirt before you die” household.
JR
@Amir Khalid: I think it’s for fire code reasons, can’t obstruct hallways etc.
mrmoshpotato
@Ohio Mom: What?! I couldn’t hear you over this jet engine on the wall!
Tom Streeter
So does anyone else get worried they’re an extra in “The Sixth Sense” when the automatic faucet refuses to turn on?
James E Powell
@JR:
All economic gains during a Democratic administration are the result of the policies of earlier Republican administrations, whereas all gains during a Republican administration are the result of the Republican’s policies.
Example: The booming economy of late Clinton administration was the result of Reagan’s tax cuts & deregulation.
Similarly, all economic downturns during Republican administrations are attributed to earlier Democratic presidents.
Example: The economic collapse of 2007-2008 was blamed on Jimmy Carter.
khead
That’s not a REAL hand dryer in the pic. If it were real someone would’ve carved “Wipe hands on pants” next to the pictorial directions.
Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)
The real problem with those jet dryers is that they eliminated the old dryers’ classic “push button, get bacon” artwork.
different-church-lady
I have been reading all of this stuff and I have reached the conclusion that no matter what I do it is going to be wrong and a bacterium will still be stuck to me and I and everyone I know will die.
mrmoshpotato
@Tom Streeter: Everyone knows ghosts don’t wash their hands.
Dirty, dirty ghosts.
different-church-lady
@Tom Streeter: I’ve yet to meet an automatic faucet that has willingly activted in my presence.
MisterForkbeard
@Aleta: My daughter’s favorite clothes are all like this. Thumb holes in the sleeves.
But then she’s only 5 and probably isn’t a harbinger of fashion.
Ohio Mom
I’ve been saying that I’m finding watching public health officials and medical scientists figure things out in real time is fascinating, but now I want to hear from economists and their predictions about what to expect.
Too late, I see the stock market has gone kablooey.
mrmoshpotato
@different-church-lady: Gh-gh-gh-gh-gh-gh-gh-gh-ghoooooooost! (picks up a full-grown Great Dane and runs away at full speed)
schrodingers_cat
Any guesses to what BS is polling at in Michigan?
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
He’s down, according to a poll I cited in the morning thread.
different-church-lady
@schrodingers_cat: Between 26 and 28 percent?
schrodingers_cat
@different-church-lady:
Ding Ding Ding we have a winner!
schrodingers_cat
And by relentlessly tweeting how Biden is senile they have considerably lowered expectations for Biden in the next debate. Such genius, much strategy, wow.
BroD
I’ve been so good this winter about moisturizing my hands (and it’s worked–only two painful finger-tip cracks.) Now I’m supposed to bathe my hands in alcohol 20x a day?!
Obviously, the fates invented this virus just to mess with me–I’m really sorry the rest of you got dragged into something I thought was just me vs them.
janesays
OT, but the DJIA is collapsing at this very minute – down just over 2,000 points. Circuit breaker freezing trading for 15 minutes already kicked in once today.
CliosFanBoy
Wash your hands as if you just ate some hot peppers and are about to
go peeput in your contact lenses.CliosFanBoy
@different-church-lady: I end up waving my hands around in the sink like I’m desperately trying to cast a complicated magic spell.
CliosFanBoy
“Employees Must Wash Hands” never works. I’ve stood there for HOURS and no employee comes to wash my hands.
A Ghost To Most
Hoognu Everclear was good for anything other than making Green Goddamns (Everclear & Gatorade).
Dlew On Roids
The other problem with jet dryers is they don’t have the instructions that were on every warm air dryer in my schools:
ONWARMAIRRoger Moore
@schrodingers_cat:
Crazification factor?
Soprano2
@WereBear: Yep, and being tired of having to pick paper towels up off the floor of the bathroom all the time. For some reason people are terrified to touch their own paper towel when it falls on the floor. When we did our remodel we got rid of paper towels in favor of a hand dryer, and this was one reason why. I prefer paper towels myself, though. We got this foot thing for the bottom of the bathroom door- it allows you to open the door with your foot. I don’t know how common they are around the country, but quite a few places around here have them.
schrodingers_cat
@Roger Moore: Yes indeed!
Florida is even better. He is at 12%
Soprano2
About the stock market – last week our investment adviser tried to tell us that the market was going down in response to Sanders winning primaries! I pushed back pretty hard on that. I’m tempted to message him after today to ask if we can agree that the market going down isn’t about who is winning Democratic primaries. He also repeated the talking point that hopefully COVID-19 will go away when the weather warms up. And no, he’s usually more realistic than this. He’s been telling us for over 2 years that the market is due for a correction, and now that it’s finally happening I think he’s pretty nervous about it.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: I will go look if it is the same poll.
Marcopolo
@Soprano2: Just me, but I’d be looking around for a new advisor who is more in touch w/ reality.
Leto
@CliosFanBoy: It’s Appear-OH aqua not Appear-UH aqua, Ron!
Marcopolo
@schrodingers_cat: Last poll I saw had Biden up by 24 points in MI. Guess we’ll find out after tomorrow.
Sanders best state tomorrow is WA.
I would not be surprised if Sanders loses ground tomorrow. A week from today he’ll probably lose ground by over 100 delegates. The last FL poll I saw did not show Sanders as viable—and if that were to hold…
Frank McCormick
Went to the movies yesterday and they had Dyson Airblade hand dryers. The thought of air splatter occurred to me but what mostly struck me was that it was way too easy to accidentally touch the plastic edges of the hand dryer!
Jinchi
If you toggle on the different presidents in that chart you’ll see that by far the best performing president is Calvin Coolidge.
The Pale Scot
Dr Richard North, who runs the blog Euroreferendum, has experience concerning export sanitation procedures
Coronavirus: dem hands
So it seems we’re better off not touching anything but ourselves and using paper to grasp the door handle on the way out.
different-church-lady
@The Pale Scot:
“…and now MY DAY HAS COME!!!”
catclub
and yet, when I did, my mother said I would grow hair on my palms.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@The Pale Scot: I can guarantee that the multiple hand washing breaks a day at the schools will be of limited usefulness. I can trace my lifelong hatred of handwashing directly to similar experiences in elementary school. My hatred of water fountains, too.
Gin & Tonic
@catclub: I’m surprised it took a full 8 minutes to get to this point.
catclub
in what world is this not true?
Life’s a bitch and then you die. But as Gandalf says, it is what use we make of the time we have.
AnderJ
It is probably astroturf marketing, but still too good not to mention: Don’t use Tito’s to make your own hand sanitizer…
https://www.housebeautiful.com/lifestyle/a31250859/titos-diy-hand-sanitizer-with-vodka/
different-church-lady
@catclub:
ACCORDING TO ALL THE NEWS I’M READING I’VE GOT LIKE FOUR DAYS.
different-church-lady
@AnderJ: And don’t drink it either.
Ruff the dog
Grain alcohol like Everclear is outlawed in my state (Maryland). Shoulda checked in PA when I was there yesterday. I have used it to mix shellac for wood finishing, because i don’t know whether the denaturing compound in denatured alcohol might leave residue on a kid’s toy. And in case a sudden blizzard traps me in my shop and I can’t tunnel the dozen feet to the house.
Uncle Cosmo
It’s a cultural/ethnic thing. Everyone knows you’re moving faster when you’re Russian in than when you’re Finnish. :^p
(Marginally-related trivia: In US construction from later than the mid-1940s one only rarely finds an external exit door that opens inward. Building codes all over the country were amended to require outward-opening exit doors in the aftermath of the 1942 Cocoanut Grove Fire, when the crush of patrons trying to escape the blaze against the inward-opening doors prevented their opening & was a major factor in the death of 492 people & the injury of hundreds more. Americans almost automatically pull on a [hand-operated!] door when entering; even now, after many trips to Europe, it’s still somewhat unsettling to me to encounter doors that open the other way.)
Just One More Canuck
@Gin & Tonic: And now I’m going to be singing the DiVinyls
Feathers
@Amir Khalid: @Uncle Cosmo: Worked somewhere where the wise ones decided to make the bathroom doors open outward. Into the hallway. It took several injuries from people getting an opening door slammed into their face or elbow to get the doors replaced and opening into the bathroom.
Ksmiami
@schrodingers_cat: As someone who knows ppl w real dementia, this attack by BS et al has enraged me. I don’t want him just defeated. I want his senate chair moved to the family restroom
schrodingers_cat
@Ksmiami: I hope he gets a primary opponent in Vt.
Have you also seen how the Sunrise Movement has beclowned it itself?
joel hanes
@MisterForkbeard:
This is a good time to take some profits in bonds, if you have any.
Ksmiami
@schrodingers_cat: no but I’ll look it up. Thanks. I’m tired of Bernie and his entire schtick
Uncle Cosmo
@different-church-lady: No doubt that’s because they operate on reflected infrared light & you are one o’ them thar coldfish LIEbruls whut absorbs all radiation in the wavelength of heat.//
MisterForkbeard
@Ksmiami: Yep. I’m right there with you. It’s a twofer:
1) A vile attack on Biden that’s wholly baseless and (as someone who has had elderly relatives with dementia) REALLY insulting
2) Literally using republican framing and propaganda to attack the likely nominee and driving him down for the general.
Fuck that noise. And BS can’t even bring himself to say anything about it or try and get his people to stop, because that’s who he is.
Uncle Cosmo
@Baud: From what I hear, BS is getting poll-axed in MI.
MisterForkbeard
@Uncle Cosmo: I see what you did there.
Some polling analysis that was interesting: Sanders is doing better with Latinos but a fair bit worse with rural whites. In CA, that’s actually a good trade. In Michigan, it’s fucking disastrous. He’s going to get a better share of 3% of the state at the expense of doing worse with 40% of the state.
I expect him to get creamed tomorrow.
Ksmiami
@MisterForkbeard: But St. Bernie is always the victim… we don’t need him nor his supporters at this point we have a country to save.
Bill Arnold
From a few days ago, and I’m reading that some of the ingredients are hard to come by at the moment, the WHO recipe scaled down to normal quantities:
Fight COVID-19 on the go with homemade hand sanitizer – We’ve got liquid and gel for all your germ-killing needs. (Sandra Gutierrez G., March 5, 2020)
Ingredients:
Marcopolo
Cory Booker off the sidelines and in for Trump. He’ll be at Biden’s campaign event today with Kamala. If I lived in MI I might even consider going–while trying to find a place to stand with no one near me.
Cory Booker endorses Joe Biden, says former VP “is the right person” to beat Trump
Just for comparison’s sake, who did Sanders have at his last MI event: Williamson & Di Blasio. Oh yeah, and Cornell West, who voted for Jill Stein in 2016.
Soprano2
@Marcopolo: That’s the weirdest thing; before this, he never gave us that “Trump happy talk” crap. We know he’s more conservative, but he’s always been in the “reasonable Republican” camp before. We talk about politics when we meet because it affects the financial world, and he always wants to know what I think about the Democratic candidates. It was weird, having to push back on that stuff, which is why I’m tempted to message him at the end of today and ask if we can now agree that what’s happening in the stock market isn’t about who the Democratic candidate is. Also, it’s not easy to find an adviser here who isn’t a Republican. It’s SWMO, where Trump won by around 70%.
Bill Arnold
@MisterForkbeard:
The thing is, the Republicans (and their non-BS alliies) appear to be betting that the Democrats (and their allies) won’t effectively counterattack with widely distributed very real video clips demonstrating D.J.Trumps very real cognitive glitches. And glitches is kind; in contest they are just the worst manifestations of dysfunction. Weird, it doesn’t even make obvious sense, tactically or strategically. Maybe the BS crowd is thinking that there will be a pivot to DJT is demented when their <strike>cult leader</strike> wins the nomination, but don’t care about damage done if their candidate does not win the nomination, and I don’t see an obvious motive from the DJT camp. (That’s probably a little hard to parse, sorry.)
Marcopolo
There is a non-trivial chance Trump will bring about his own demise. Remember that time during the eclipse when he looked at the sun w/out any eye protection?
Here he is this morning:
From my lips to the FSM ears.
schrodingers_cat
@Ksmiami: I am paraphrasing,
Totally not a cult.
Ksmiami
@schrodingers_cat: ugh
scott (the other one)
If I need to touch something in the bathroom after I’ve washed my hands—a door handle, say—I grab the bottom of my shirt and use it as a barrier between my skin and whatever it is I need to touch. Not very fashionable but I have to assume at least a bit more hygienic.
Geminid
I hope Sanders gets creamed tomorrow for a lot of reasons. One is that he might recognize he’s lost and quit or at least slow down. He’ll kill himself if he tries to keep going all out. Looks worse and worse every week.
Shalimar
@schrodingers_cat: So many people regretting they had children now.
MisterForkbeard
@Ksmiami: We do kind of need his supporters, sadly. It’s all hands on deck for November.
I posted this in my facebook feed after having to post something similar to too many Bernie trolls who are committed to saying that Biden is just a Republican and at best just won’t do anything:
Shalimar
@Geminid: I seriously doubt that he is capable of giving up so I don’t expect him to. But, if he wants to save face, he should suspend his campaign before Florida. Because he is going to lose by 50+ points here.
MisterForkbeard
@Bill Arnold: The DJT camp just says Trump is Trump and will handwave concerns about his mental state away.
Biden has done some things that look pretty weird if you don’t know he has a stutter. This is true! Trump (meanwhile) just word-shotguns the shit out of everything and has real and severe issues.
I think it’ll come up in the general. And honestly, Biden can make the point pretty well: “I have a stutter – I’ve fought it my whole life. Sometimes it makes me trail off, or I can’t find the right words. And on my worst day I’m still miles better than Donald Trump, who <insert thing trump did yesterday>”, etc.
Ksmiami
@MisterForkbeard: if you look at the cross tabs, most of Bernie’s supporters are unreliable voters do I guess I meant that if getting rid of Trump isn’t enough motivation, then I’d rather spend my time converting ppl like my moderate neighbors who will now vote Biden because they understand how awful Trump is
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat I’d ask if I could sit next to you but now I’m afraid.
schrodingers_cat
@Kathleen: I just had lunch so my mood has improved. You can totally sit next to me.
Kathleen
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat: ❤❤❤ Lunch is always good! The older I get, (I’m 70) the more I need food and sleep. Like an infant!
Uncle Cosmo
@schrodingers_cat: Imbeciles. Threatening not to have kids? Most Boomers who want grandkids already have grandkids, & many of them are of voting age (or close to it). My li’l bro who was born about halfway through the Boomer interval & fathered late already has two.
schrodingers_cat
@Uncle Cosmo: Boomer is their generic slur for anyone they consider “old”. Which could be anyone >30 .
Uncle Cosmo
@Geminid: BS is in dire need of a visit from The Knight Of The Mirrors. Just might wake him up to the facts:
Then again, probably not. To paraphrase Upton Sinclair,
Feathers
@Marcopolo: Boris Johnson tried to shake the hands of one of the clerics at the Queen’s Commonwealth Service today.* Funny to see the guy in robes and mitered hat jump backwards.
J R in WV
@schrodingers_cat:
When I was that age our slogan was “Never trust anyone over 30!” because that was who was sending us to Vietnam to die for their illegal war. Now, of course, I’m nearly 70, but still anti-war, anti-republican, anti-corporate influence, pro-tax, etc., etc.
BroD
Feh! I’m too old to be a boomer.
PenAndKey
I know this is likely a dead thread, but these things bring to mind a statement my advisor shared with every class when we were starting our microbiology journey in college. He was very firmly of the opinion that nobody should ever use air dryers for hand washing. And since he was a former brick layer turned college professor he was fond of describing them as shit sprayers. That has stuck with me ever since, and I’m not at all surprised to see the research back up his belief. You really don’t want to do a fecal coliform swab in a bathroom that has one of these things in it.