Grocery Shopping Cart Seats: The Dirty Little Secrets
Unbeknownst to most parents, many grocery shopping carts and restaurant high chairs are covered with numerous, and potentially harmful, germs. Just imagine how many children have left their saliva and mucous on the handles and bars of the carts and chairs. The worst scenario involves parents touching multiple, leaking packages of beef and chicken to find the “best package,” then putting their hands back on the shopping cart handle. My husband and I noticed how often our first child would bite and chew on whatever was in front of him, whether grocery shopping cart handles or high chair rails. It bothered me and I had to figure out a way to protect my child from all of the harmful germs.
During my research, I came across a report on contaminated shopping carts. In 1998, Doctor Kelly Reynolds, a microbiologist at the University of Arizona, visited six Tucson supermarkets while doing research to determine how certain bacteria find their way into people’s homes. “I decided to pay special attention to contact points that were frequently touched by shoppers but rarely, if ever, cleaned,” says Dr. Reynolds. “When we asked supermarkets how frequently shopping carts were cleaned, the answer often was, almost never.” In her investigation, Dr. Reynolds discovered that twenty percent (20%) of the carts tested positive for bodily fluids, blood, mucus, saliva or urine, which could transmit infectious germs.
Another story I came across was from Linda Yee, a reporter with KRON (Channel 4), a television station in San Francisco who went to the Department of Public Works and watched workers wearing bio-hazard suits remove trash and human waste from shopping carts collected on the streets. KRON-4 randomly selected and tested several of these carts and found that half of them tested positive for fecal coliform, the bacteria derived from human excrement, as well as fecal strep and E.coli. Yee found that when these carts were returned to the supermarkets they were immediately put back in service without being cleaned!
How many times have we exposed our children to harmful germs and didn’t even know it? There are different types of shopping cart seat covers and restaurant high chair covers designed to protect our children from these harmful germs and bacteria. I have discovered two general designs: 1) minimum coverage and 2) full coverage. The bare minimum coverage shopping cart seat covers really only cover the bar or handle around your little one, but they are small and can easily fold up to about the size of a diaper, which is convenient. The full coverage shopping cart seat cover design is usually made with a thick batting material in between to cushion baby’s bottom. Additionally, the elastic sewn in allows you to stretch the material around all four sides of the shopping cart seat, as well as, mommy’s handle. I have recently noticed a new double or twin version of these shopping cart seat covers on the Sam’s and Costco double seat shopping carts.
Finally, there are many different manufacturers of shopping cart seat covers each with their own unique design and features. However, the end result is still the same which is to protect your little shopper from the germs and harmful bacteria found on dirty restaurant high chairs and shopping carts.
During my research, I came across a report on contaminated shopping carts. In 1998, Doctor Kelly Reynolds, a microbiologist at the University of Arizona, visited six Tucson supermarkets while doing research to determine how certain bacteria find their way into people’s homes. “I decided to pay special attention to contact points that were frequently touched by shoppers but rarely, if ever, cleaned,” says Dr. Reynolds. “When we asked supermarkets how frequently shopping carts were cleaned, the answer often was, almost never.” In her investigation, Dr. Reynolds discovered that twenty percent (20%) of the carts tested positive for bodily fluids, blood, mucus, saliva or urine, which could transmit infectious germs.
Another story I came across was from Linda Yee, a reporter with KRON (Channel 4), a television station in San Francisco who went to the Department of Public Works and watched workers wearing bio-hazard suits remove trash and human waste from shopping carts collected on the streets. KRON-4 randomly selected and tested several of these carts and found that half of them tested positive for fecal coliform, the bacteria derived from human excrement, as well as fecal strep and E.coli. Yee found that when these carts were returned to the supermarkets they were immediately put back in service without being cleaned!
How many times have we exposed our children to harmful germs and didn’t even know it? There are different types of shopping cart seat covers and restaurant high chair covers designed to protect our children from these harmful germs and bacteria. I have discovered two general designs: 1) minimum coverage and 2) full coverage. The bare minimum coverage shopping cart seat covers really only cover the bar or handle around your little one, but they are small and can easily fold up to about the size of a diaper, which is convenient. The full coverage shopping cart seat cover design is usually made with a thick batting material in between to cushion baby’s bottom. Additionally, the elastic sewn in allows you to stretch the material around all four sides of the shopping cart seat, as well as, mommy’s handle. I have recently noticed a new double or twin version of these shopping cart seat covers on the Sam’s and Costco double seat shopping carts.
Finally, there are many different manufacturers of shopping cart seat covers each with their own unique design and features. However, the end result is still the same which is to protect your little shopper from the germs and harmful bacteria found on dirty restaurant high chairs and shopping carts.
posted by Kozy Kid Creations at
10:19 AM
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