Hygiene expert reveals how often you should actually wash your clothes
Can you wear the same pair of trousers for a week at a time? Can you steam iron your clothes instead of washing them? Markus Egert, Professor of Microbiology at Furtwangen University, author, and expert in household hygiene, explains what’s key to keeping your clothes clean.
Some people swear by unlaundered jeans. Do you find that nasty?
Prof. Dr. Markus Egert: That depends on what people do with their jeans. Though it’s something I certainly wouldn’t recommend. While there’s probably no health risk from a microbiological standpoint, the jeans will eventually grow unsightly and musty.
Is there a rough rule of thumb as to how often you can wear clothes before washing them?
Laboratories, hospitals and the food sector, for example, have clear regulations. But these can’t be generalised to everyday clothing; we wash our clothes primarily to remove odours and stains. How quickly they start to smell or get stained depends on the person.
What factors play a role?
Your job, for example. Working in an office is less taxing on your clothes than working in, say, a butcher’s shop. It also depends on how much you sweat, how strong your sense of hygiene is and the item of clothing.
Which items of clothing should you always wash after a single wear?
Sportswear, underwear, socks and anything else that’s worn directly on the body and comes into contact with areas where you sweat more.
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Which items of clothing can you be less strict about?
Well, seeing as we were just talking about jeans; I easily wear mine for a week at a time without worrying about germs. If there’s no particular reason to wash them, such as odours or visible dirt, it’s usually fine to wash outerwear such as trousers and jumpers once a week.
Even if you’ve been wearing them on public transport?
Your clothing obviously comes into contact with microorganisms there. However, it doesn’t typically pose a direct risk of infection for healthy people. In a medical setting, of course, it’s a different story. Nevertheless, I personally don’t know any healthy person who’s picked up an infection via their own clothing. Thorough handwashing is more important on that front.
Professions aside, what kind of people should place more importance on having clean clothes?
People with skin conditions such as neurodermatitis or psoriasis, people with allergies and people with open wounds, such as those caused by diabetes. You should also take extra care around clothing cleanliness if you have athlete’s foot or other infections.
Garments such as coats rarely see the inside of a washing machine. Is it okay to just take them to the dry cleaner every two years?
There’s nothing wrong with that from a hygiene point of view. If we’re talking about a wool coat, moths are the more likely problem. With that in mind, it’s a good idea to wash your coat or have it cleaned at the end of winter before you stash it away in the wardrobe for months on end.
People do tend to wash wool garments less often. A lot of people say it’s because the material’s naturally antibacterial.
Sure, but that doesn’t replace a wash cycle. Wood has antimicrobial properties too, but I still wash my chopping boards after I use them. So even if your socks are made of wool, you shouldn’t wear them for a week at a time without washing them.
There are a few tricks people use to postpone laundry day. Putting clothes in the freezer for a few hours, for example.
That’s silly. Just because something’s stored at minus 20 degrees Celsius doesn’t mean it’ll be hygienically clean afterwards. To give you a comparison, frozen mince contains just as many germs as the freshly bought stuff. Yes, that temperature kills off a few bugs, but they bounce back quickly. When it comes to hygiene, cold is never as effective as heat.
Maybe it’s better to use a steamer then? I mean, steaming supposedly kills 99.9 per cent of germs.
As a matter of fact, hospitals use steam to sterilise clothes. But chances are they have more efficient steamers than the ones you’d typically find bubbling away in people’s homes. These everyday steamers are no substitute for machine washing or professional cleaning. That being said, they’re definitely not a bad option if you just want to freshen a garment up.
Source: Stephanie Vinzens
What about antibacterial textile sprays?
The main thing they do is mask bad smells. These sprays are okay if you’re in a pinch, but they’re expensive and almost certainly harmful to the environment. I wouldn’t recommend them.
You can also air out your clothes in the sun.
Sun and fresh air are great. UV radiation is antimicrobial, eliminates bad odours and costs nothing. It also dries clothes quickly, which is the key to good laundry hygiene.
So can you just hang your jeans out in the sun instead of washing them?
No. At best, that’ll just delay the need to wash them. After all, washing machines clean clothes in different ways. There’s the chemical aspect, i.e. the detergent, the temperature, the wringing out and the time (an average wash program takes about 60–90 minutes). None of the other methods we’ve talked about can replace that combination.
Is it possible to wash your clothes too often?
Definitely. Overly frequent washing can damage both fabrics and the environment, so it’s better to wear outerwear for two or three extra days.
Do you think people wash their clothes too often these days?
I don’t have any data on that, but I’d tend to say yes. At the same time, textiles are becoming more and more delicate, which isn’t good from a hygiene perspective.
What do you mean?
People are increasingly washing their clothes at lower temperatures and using liquid detergents instead of washing powder. These liquid varieties don’t contain bleach, so they’re less consistent at getting rid of germs. Washing clothes hygienically is particularly important for garments that come into close contact with the skin, such as socks and underwear. It’s less of an issue for outerwear. In fact, the presence of bacteria on outerwear might even be beneficial to a degree.
Could you elaborate on that?
Everyday clothing doesn’t need to be sterile. In keeping with the principle behind probiotics, it’s possible that having bacteria on your clothing could even have a positive impact on your health. Unfortunately, I’m not aware of any recent studies on this, but I think it’d be interesting to investigate. After all, we have a large number of bacteria living on our skin as it is.
Header image: Karolina Grabowska via Pexels
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Has endless love for shoulder pads, Stratocasters and sashimi, but a limited tolerance for bad impressions of her Eastern Swiss dialect.
