There's A Very Real Chance Your Kitchen Sink Is Crawling With Bacteria — Even If It Looks Clean
Think of all the things that happen in your kitchen sink. It's where you wash your hands, scrub dishes, rinse fruits and vegetables, and drain packages of raw meat. You might also use it to clean paintbrushes and lots of other things or give your puppy a bath.
'Any germs on these items will wash off, and most will go down the drain — but some can get caught in the crevices' or the garbage disposal, if you have one, explained Lester Schonberger, associate extension specialist at the Virginia Tech Department of Food Science and Technology.
Once they're there, germs can survive and thrive, as bacteria often love warm, moist environments like your kitchen sink. Depending on how you use it, Schonberger said, you could find 'any number of microorganisms' in the sink, and they have the potential to make you sick.
Because of this, experts say, the kitchen sink is among the germiest spots in your kitchen. A 2023 U.S. Department of Agriculture study found that 34% of kitchen sinks were contaminated with bacteria after participants prepared breakfast with raw sausage, eggs and cantaloupe. More than a quarter of the cut-up cantaloupe was contaminated, which the USDA said likely happened when bacteria from the sink was transferred to the melon when it was washed.
So should you worry about the germs in your kitchen sink? Safety experts explain why it can harbor microorganisms and how this might affect your health.
While it depends on exactly what you're doing in your kitchen sink, it could be home to salmonella, E. coli and listeria — especially in the drain, which people typically don't clean and sanitize, said Kevin Roberts, director of the hospitality management program at Kansas State University.
'Pretty much any foodborne bacteria that you could think of could be harbored in that sink,' he said.
Research supports the germy nature of kitchen sinks, Schonberger said.
A small 2022 study of 10 households published in Frontiers in Microbiology found that most were contaminated with multiple pathogens. In another study from 2017, out of 100 homes, fecal coliforms were found in 44%, mostly in samples from kitchen sinks, and 15% tested positive for E. coli.
Bacteria tend to lurk in kitchen sinks because they're the 'perfect environment' for these germs to grow, said Mitzi Baum, former CEO of Stop Foodborne Illness. There's moisture, bits of food, warmth and air, and if the sink isn't cleaned regularly, things have time to thrive.
Objects typically kept in the sink, like sponges, can be another source of contamination, Roberts said. A 2011 study by the public health and safety organization NSF asked 22 families to swab household items and found that 75% of dish sponges and rags contained E. coli and salmonella, and 45% of kitchen sinks had these bacteria.
Cross-contamination is the main issue with the germs in your kitchen sink, Schonberger said. 'If your sink or drain is contaminated, then we'd need to be mindful about the ways in which those bacteria may get out of the sink and into your food.'
For instance, if you place a bunch of grapes in your sink to wash them or fill the sink with water to submerge leafy greens, he said, you could 'dislodge some of the bacteria onto your food' or splash water onto the countertops, contaminating that surface. E. coli, salmonella and listeria can all make people sick, Baum said.
'If given the opportunity to grow in your sink and food that is not being cooked makes contact with the sink, there is an opportunity for you to get sick,' she said. 'The food could pick up the bacteria — there's no such thing as the five-second rule. If the food is in the right conditions for too long, you could get sick.'
Signs of a foodborne illness from these bacteria can include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, headache and muscle cramps or weakness, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It can be severe — an estimated 48 million Americans get foodborne illness each year, and 3,000 die from it.
People most at risk for foodborne illness (and getting severely ill) include people 65 and older, children under 5, pregnant women and individuals with weakened immune systems, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
However, Schonberger said, 'Most average adults who contract foodborne illness will experience some symptoms but should fully recover.'
Simply rinsing your sink isn't enough to kill germs, Schonberger said. The water from your tap likely won't dislodge bacteria hiding out in the sink's crevices and doesn't get hot enough to kill germs.
To get rid of germs and minimize cross-contamination with food, you need to clean and disinfect your sink regularly, Roberts said. 'You can't sanitize something that's not clean.'
Use warm, soapy water to clean the sink, he said. The goal is to remove any dirt, debris and bits of food; use a toothbrush or toothpick to dislodge things stuck in the crevices, Schonberger said. Then, rinse out the soap and dry it with paper towels.
Once dry, use a sanitizer to kill bacteria or a disinfectant, which also will kill viruses, and let the sink air dry, Schonberger said. Products with bleach or alcohol, including wipes, can disinfect and sanitize — just follow the instructions on the item's label. This guide will help you know what to look for.
You can make your own sanitizer by mixing 1/2 teaspoon of 4.5% sodium hypochlorite bleach for every quart of water (or 32 fluid ounces) or disinfectant by mixing 1/2 cup of the bleach for every gallon of water, according to the Virginia Cooperative Extension.
Roberts suggests cleaning and sanitizing your kitchen sink before and after preparing meals, especially when raw meat is involved, or at least once a week. This will help you avoid cross-contamination and potentially getting sick.
Remember, too, that you can't see bacteria on your kitchen sink, he emphasized. 'Just because it looks clean doesn't mean it's clean, doesn't mean it's sanitized.'
If You're Wondering How Microplastics Even Get In Your Food, Read This
5 Foods And Drinks To Avoid At The Airport, According To Food Safety Experts
Why You Should Seriously Consider Reheating Food Delivery That Arrives Lukewarm
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Forbes
2 hours ago
- Forbes
Over 256,000 Pounds Of Canned Beef Stew Recalled Due To Wood Fragments
Hormel Foods Corporation is voltartarily recalling around 256,185 pounds of its Dinty Moore canned ... More beef stew product. (Photo: Getty) Three consumers had a beef about this stew. Apparently, they had found pieces of wood in their Dinty Moore Beef Stew and complained to the makers of the stew, Hormel Foods Corporation. Rather than have anyone else potentially stew over the situation, Hormel decided then to recall voluntarily around 256,185 pounds of its canned beef stew product, according to an announcement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service. The recall affects a specific lot of Dinty Moore Beef Stew that was packaged in 20 ounce cans on February 4, 2025. These cans were shipped across the U.S. If you want to determine whether your Dinty Moore Beef Stew is affected by the recall, the canned answer is look for a lot code of 'T02045', an establishment number of 'EST 199G' and a 'Best By' date of "FEB 2028.' If you find such things when you are on the can, naturally, your 'best by date' for that should be never. You should either safely discard the product or return it for a refund. Even though there haven't yet been any confirmed reports of injuries from consuming the product, you 'wood' not want to risk it yourself. In general, it's not a good idea to eat wood if you are a human or even if you are a woodchuck for that matter. Chewing on wood could end up damaging your teeth and gums. Plus, humans lack the digestive enzymes to break down wood. So if you swallow some wood, it's going to remain roughly the same shape and form straight through your gastrointestinal tract. This is similar to situation where glass was found in bread, leading to a recall, which I wrote about in Forbes earlier this month. Size (and shape) matter here. If the piece is small enough and not too sharp, it will likely just pass through your system until a few days later where poop there is. However, the risk is that the wood will get caught up somewhere in your GI tract, causing damage to the lining of your GI tract or blockage. This could lead to some type of infection as well. Therefore, if you are concerned about having ingested wood, contact a healthcare professional to get some guidance. You certainly want to seek medical advice if you have symptoms such as chest or abdominal pain, nausea or vomiting. Other possible symptoms of a potential problem could be changes in bowel movements or body temperature like a fever. Since another potential risk is an allergic reaction to something in the wood, be aware of any itching, rashes, difficulty breathing or any sign that you may be having such a reaction. Chew marks on a pencil may or may not be a sign of lignophagia (Photo: Getty) Now if you are thinking, 'wood fragments, yum,' there is something called lignophagia, where you actually like to chew on or eat wood. It comes from a combo of the Latin word 'lignum,' which stands for "wood", and the Greek word 'phago,' which means to 'to eat.' Another term for eating wood is 'xylophagia' when it occurs in human. Lignophagia is a type of pica disorder. Pica is where you want to chew or eat something that has no nutritional value. You may remember as a kid being handed pencils with bite marks all over them. That's assuming that you are old enough to know what a pencil is. Such bite marks may or may not have been a sign of lignophagia, depending on whether there was a specific preference for wood versus just chewing on something nervously or out of habit. Nevertheless, one should not be encouraged to chew on or eat wood at any time for all the aforementioned reasons. The recall notice didn't specify the size of the wood fragments that were found in the beef stew. Presumably they weren't like entire planks of wood, since those would have been tough to fit inside a can. So, this situation may end up not having any adverse health effects. But it's still a good idea to check your beef stew and the can from where it came.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Mayor O'Connell has a plan for Nashville. Why isn't feeding everyone included?
Editor's note: Letters to the editor reflect the views of individual readers. Scroll to see how you can add your voice, whether you agree or disagree, or click on this link to fill out the form. We welcome diverse viewpoints. Re: Mayor outlines 'challenging' budget recommendations in State of Metro, May 1. There is one thing noticeably absent in the Mayor's agenda for Nashville. This city has struggled with food apartheid, measured and mapped by Dr. Padgett decades ago. It still has not been resolved in 2025, and so the 'It City' continues to strive for access to healthful, culturally-appropriate foods. More: Two decades after a landmark study, food insecurity in North Nashville persists Food insecurity rates will continue to increase as the federal government cuts SNAP and USDA grants. Food insecurity will further increase as the state government cuts school meals and summer meals and fails to pass grocery tax relief. And so, it is left to this metropolitan government to address the systemic inequities of our food system to feed Nashvillians. Metro funded FeedBack Nashville, a year-long study of Nashville's food system, from agriculture, to access, to disposal. But the city has not shared the study's results. Nor has Metro taken any action to address the problems or implement the solutions found in the study. Opinion: As a nurse in rural Tennessee, I know how food deserts harm residents I urge the Mayor and the Council to consider and address the many implications of Nashville's broken food system each time they talk about the state of our city. I urge them to follow up on the investment made in FeedBack Nashville. And I urge them to set aside funding for further food systems work in the new budget. People cannot work without food. Children cannot learn without food. Nashville cannot thrive without a just food system. Jeannie Hunter, Madison 37115 Agree or disagree? Or have a view on another topic entirely? Send a letter of 250 words or fewer to letters@ Include your full name, city/town, ZIP and contact information for verification. Thanks for adding to the public conversation. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Mayor O'Connell should fix Nashville's broken food system | Letters
Medscape
7 hours ago
- Medscape
Wireless Face e-Tattoo Tracks Mental Strain and Workload
A temporary electronic forehead tattoo that wirelessly measures brainwaves and eye movement may offer an accurate measurement of mental workload (MWL) and mental strain, new research suggested. E-tattoo to track mental workload in real time Using a lightweight battery and thin sensors, the e-tattoo was able to reliably collect electroencephalography (EEG) and electrooculography (EOG) data to estimate MWL in a small study of six participants as they completed increasingly difficult memory tests. The technology is a less bulky and cheaper alternative to conventional brain activity monitors and may help track the mental workload of workers in safety-critical jobs like aviation, air traffic control, and healthcare. Researchers say it also has applications for neurological monitoring of patients with epilepsy or to monitor cognitive decline. 'Our wireless electronic tattoo stands out for its ultrathin, skin-conformal design, which allows for stable EEG/EOG signal acquisition even during dynamic activities like walking or facial movements,' investigator Nanshu Lu, PhD, professor and chair of engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, told Medscape Medical News . 'Unlike other platforms like headbands or glasses, our tattoo is helmet-compatible, low-profile, and uses low-cost disposable materials, making it uniquely suitable for real-world deployment.' The findings were published online on May 29 in the journal Device . Study Details and Performance There is no universally accepted definition of MWL, but it can generally be described as the degree to which a person's working memory capacity and cognitive processes are engaged by an ongoing task, the authors noted. MWL levels can be assessed using subjective self-assessment questionnaires like the post-task NASA Task Load Index, as well as physiological measures such as heart rate, galvanic skin response, EEG, and EOG. The wireless e-tattoo features stretchable serpentine-shaped, graphite-deposited polyurethane electrodes coated with an adhesive poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) poly-styrene sulfonate composite to reduce impedance and improve adhesion to the skin. The e-tattoo is integrated with a battery-powered flexible printed circuit that transmits EEG and EOG data in real-time via Bluetooth Low Energy. To evaluate the e-tattoo efficacy, the researchers analyzed EEG and EOG signals collected on six healthy participants wearing the wireless forehead e-tattoo during cognitive tasks designed to measure working memory, called dual N-back tasks. Self-assessment using the NASA–Task Load Index, task performance metrics, and physiological features were also collected. Each participant completed a single experiment session lasting approximately 2.5 hours, which included three runs of N-back trials. 'This single-session design was sufficient to train individualized models, although variability between participants was observed, especially in the relative importance of EEG vs EGO features,' Lu said. As the cognitive workload increased, frontal delta- and theta-band powers increased, while alpha-, beta-, and gamma-band powers decreased. The authors noted this is in line with studies linking theta-band power to an increase in working memory load and increasing MWL with a decrease in alpha power and increase in frontal theta power. To test the viability of mental workload estimation using the e-tattoo, the researchers then built a random forest model to predict the level of mental workload experienced by participants during the N -back tasks. They found that the model successfully estimated the mental workload for all N levels for all six participants. 'Key findings of our study show that the wireless forehead e-tattoo reliably captures forehead EEG and EOG signals, and these signals can be used to accurately estimate mental workload during a dual N-back task, which is a widely used standard mental workload test,' Lu said. 'Our model achieved robust classification of cognitive load levels using only minimally processed physiological data.' The Road Ahead For forehead EEG/EOG–driven workload detection, the e-tattoo system is already self-sufficient but integration with other physiological sensors such as heart rate or galvanic skin response could improve accuracy and robustness in mental workload vs mental stress differentiation, Lu noted. 'In medical settings, this technology could be very useful for neurological monitoring, including early detection of cognitive decline, noninvasive epilepsy tracking, and assessing patient engagement during neurorehabilitation,' she said. 'Its comfort and unobtrusiveness make it especially appealing for pediatric or geriatric use.' The temporary e-tattoo also holds a cost advantage over traditional EEG systems, with the e-tattoo chips and battery pack priced at $200 and disposable sensors about $20 each. 'Being low-cost makes the device accessible,' study co-author Luis Sentis, PhD, also from The University of Texas at Austin, said in a news release. 'One of my wishes is to turn the e-tattoo into a product we can wear at home.' Currently, the e-tattoo works only on hairless skin but the researchers are working to combine it with ink-based sensors that work on hair. For this new study, Lu also noted that EEG signals were postprocessed and the predictions done offline. 'To make this technology really valuable, we can and need to achieve real-time mental workload assessment and provide timely micro-interventions, such as visual or audio alerts on the phone or even electro tactile stimulations applied to the skin by the e-tattoo before performance decline or burnout occurs,' she said. 'Evaluating these micro-interventions in real-world applications may prove our EEG system's capacity to significantly improve human-AI collaborations,' Sentis told Medscape Medical News .
