Eli5 how are electric hand dryers worse than paper towels when it comes to pathogens?
In: Biology
This is mainly a point made against the high- pressure Dyson hand dryers; they blow air with such high pressure that they fling water droplets into the air off the wet hand. If the hands in question were not cleaned properly (meaning soap scrubbed for 30 seconds), there will be contaminants like bacteria and viruses left over. These can survive in the water droplets being sprayed from the hand dryer and land on either directly on another person, or indirectly on a “touch surface”, such as a door handle or faucet handle.
~~Standard hand dryers use low pressure and heat so the water vaporizes, leaving behind any contaminants.~~ (See correction below) Paper towels absorb whatever water they come into contact with and are discarded. In both cases, there is no transmission of contaminants due to the drying method.
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