- [Narrator] Face it, your house is filthy.
It's filled with dead skin cells, dust,
and around 200,000 different species
of bug, bacteria, and fungus.
Now, it's tempting to assume that most
of them live in your toilet.
After all it's where, you know,
but here's the thing,
the dirtiest place in your house isn't your toilet.
It's actually you.
Household microbes lurk in the most unlikely of places.
Take a heat loving bacteria called Thermus aquaticus,
there guys can only be found in two environments,
blisteringly hot geysers like Old Faithful at Yellowstone
and your hot water heater.
Another example is Penicillium fungi.
They creep into your air conditioner from outdoors
and when you switch on the AC
their spores get blasted around the house.
They're known to cause allergies in 2-6% of people.
So when you notice a funny musty smell coming from your AC
it's probably the fungus,
but before you start eyeing your central air suspiciously,
think about this, you dump microbes all over your body
every time you shower.
It turns out trillions of organisms live in your shower head
pilled on top of each other in a slimy layer
half a millimeter thick,
but that's not necessarily a problem.
Researchers found that a type
of shower dwelling microbacterium
actually boosts levels of serotonin.
That's a neurotransmitter thought to lower stress
and increase happiness,
and when those arrant microbacteria land on you
they join the tens of thousands of other microbe species
that live in the dirtiest place around, your body,
like Corynebacterium,
the microbes that give your armpits that stinky odor
and simultaneously fight off harmful pathogens
like E. Coli.
Meanwhile, 300 to 500 species of microbe colonize your gut
and are thought to play a role
in maintaining your immune system,
digestive system and even mental health.
In the non bacteria category, microbes,
you've got such guests as microscopic mites
that live on your face
and mole that colonizes into your toes.
While the idea of them might give you chills,
microbes like these help keep you safe.
You see the number of
harmless microbial species in the world
outnumber harmful ones, by a trillion to one.
In fact, less than 0,00000001% of microbial species
account for nearly all infectious diseases in the world
and all these harmless bacteria crawling on your skin
means less room and resources for pathogens
like antibiotic resistant microbes,
which also means they have less opportunity
to take over and make you sick.
So even when antibiotics fail,
it could be all those other microbes crawling in
and on you that keep you safe.
So in a way, you need to get a little dirty to stay healthy,
but full disclosure,
that's not an excuse to swear off your shower.
Besides, you don't wanna miss out
on that feel good microbacterium.
This video was made in large part thanks to Rob Dunn
and the information in his new book Never Home Alone.