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Blowing out birthday candles boosts bacteria to disgusting levels

Birthday cake lovers, beware. If you’ve ever taken part of the classic birthday ritual — you know: dimmed lights, loud singing of “Happy Birthday” followed by candle blowing — you’ve participated in a very disgusting tradition. Researchers at Clemson University recently conducted a study to find out whether significant bacteria is transferred to the cake when someone blows out their candles. Mimicking a traditional child’s birthday party, participants ate several slices of pizza before volunteering to blow out candles on top of an ordinary birthday cake. A control group cake had no party-goers blow on it. Then the two were compared. Researchers found that the cake where the candles had been blown out had more than 1,400% more bacteria than the cake that was left alone. Interestingly, people blew greatly varied number of bacteria — some didn’t transfer any, and some, for whatever reason, transferred a lot. (Maybe a germaphobic researcher out…

Alarming incidents will have you avoiding hotel coffee and tea kettles

Boiling a hot cup of water for tea or coffee can be a relaxing way to unwind in your hotel room after a long day of traveling, but new information might have you thinking twice before using that kettle. Some guests may be using the hot water boiling appliance to clean dirty underwear. https://twitter.com/YugSTAR/status/900098691804971008 The alarming action came to light when someone presented a question to Twitter followers: “Real question: does anyone I know clean their underwear in a kettle when traveling?” But the question wasn’t an isolated incident. Similar rumors about people washing their undergarments in hotel kettles have been seen on Weibo, China’s Twitter-esque online social media site. Experts are warning of the dangers this type of action can leave for the next hotel guests. Dr. Heather Hendrickson, a senior lecturer in molecular biosciences at the Institute of Natural and Mathematical Sciences at Massey University in Auckland, told Gizmodo about the serious health…