My friend Joel Gallant wrote this provocative post on his heavily trafficked Facebook page:
While standing in line at the cafeteria today, it occurred to me that it was once acceptable to use your fingers to pick up a bagel, a piece of bread, or a cookie from a tray, but this is now viewed as an antisocial act. Everything requires a serving utensil, including tongs for hand-held food. I’m no germophobe, but it occurred to me, while trying to wrestle a very large bagel off a tray using a very small pair of tongs, that this new etiquette is a big step backwards in terms of hygiene and infection control.
Imagine a cafeteria line during cold season. Someone in front of you has a viral infection. Perhaps he blew or wiped his nose before getting in line, or sneezed into his hands instead of his sleeves. Which would would you prefer: that he grab a cookie between his thumb and index finger, with the risk that he MIGHT touch an adjacent cookie in the process, or that he pick up a pair of plastic tongs with his snot-laden hands, the same pair of tongs that will be handled by everyone who follows him in line?
I’m lucky for two reasons — first, Joel gave me permission to bring this important issue to you readers of this site, whose interests skew towards matters of infections in general, and likely for some of you, food safety.
Second, he’s such a clear writer that he’s articulated the debate perfectly. Do these ubiquitous serving tongs actually prevent infections? Or do they facilitate their spread?
To clarify, this controversy is only about the use of tongs for dry food items — bagels, cookies, a slice of bread, a muffin. No one is suggesting we start using our hands to serve ourselves sliced cucumbers in the salad bar, or lasagna and beef bourguignon in the cafeteria line.
That would just be messy, infectious risks aside.
A quick search on the matter quickly yields this study, which not surprisingly shows that E. coli can be passed back and forth between hands and salad tongs.
And if it’s viruses you’re worried about, this study showed plenty of norovirus and adenovirus on “environmental surfaces” at “food service operations” — but did not specifically mention tongs.
For the record, Joel expressed his personal conflict of interest on the matter:
Disclaimer: I’m not impartial; I’m a klutz with tongs.
He also sent me this photo of tongs being used for foil-wrapped food, which he views as an example of tong-mania taken to an absurd extreme. Practically a “Tong [sic] Dynasty”, if you’ll pardon the terrible pun.
I guess he’s obsessed.
So what do you think?