1/29/19-As a person reading this website on some sort of technological device, you’ve probably heard that phone screens are really, really nasty. But that stat doesn’t even begin to compare with the average steering wheel, which is apparently far nastier than the average elevator button, toilet seat or smartphone.
On Friday, the San Francisco Chronicle cited a study from CarRentals.com, which is owned by Expedia, that looked at just how gross the inside of a vehicle can get. Why a company that rents cars to people would publicly call attention to how gross cars are, the world may never know.
Regardless, the study found that there are about 700 strains of bacteria in the average vehicle, and the steering wheel is the nastiest part of the whole thing. Eating in your car is the way to get the bacteria machine rolling even faster than it already does, the study said, and, apparently, eating in a car is more likely to make you sick than eating off of a toilet seat.
The steering wheel is the dirtiest place in a car, according to the study, ahead of the cupholder, seat belt, inside door handle, shifter and volume knob. The study found that the wheel is twice as dirty as the buttons on an elevator, four times as gross as a toilet seat, and six times nastier than a smartphone screen. (Data from a study is just that, remember. Other studies have found that public toilets are cleaner than phone screens, but this one found toilets dirtier.)
On top of all of that, the CarRentals.com study surveyed 1,000 people on their car-cleaning habits and found that 32 percent of drivers only clean their vehicle once a year, and 12 percent said they never did.