Docs advise diapers over public loos

Dr Dipak Chatterjee

Public toilets without continuous supply of clean water, proper ventilation (at least one ventilator), and drainage can cause a lot of distress to the user. Bad smell, originating out of unclean loos, can cause nausea. Puddles of water can become breeding grounds for mosquitoes and lead to diseases such as malaria and dengue.

Scrubbing the toilet bowl only once in seven days (as per the BMC guidelines) can make toilet-users — especially women — vulnerable to a host of infections. The chief and most common among them is urinary infection.

Here, women need to be most careful. Those with severe bladder or liver-related problems should use adult diapers instead of using a public toilet frequently. This may be a costly way out, but it certainly is the safer way out. 

As it is, the city is burdened with more than it can bear. This is the reason why infections spread across the city so rapidly. Here are some severe infections that one can contract from using unclean public toilets:

• Syphilis
• Gonorrhea 
• Pruritus
• Urinary infection

Health hazard: Scrubbing the toilet bowl only once in seven days (as per BMC guidelines) makes toilet-users vulnerable to a host of infections

Why would you not use a public toilet?

• 70 % Unhygienic
• 21 % Unsafe
• 9 % Untraceable