THE DEADLY HANDSHAKE.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 142, 17 June 1926, Page 9

THE DEADLY HANDSHAKE.

SCATTERING MICROBES. ADVICE TO SALESMEN. The friendly gesture known as the handshake has been slapped hard by Dr. H. W. Hill, professor of bacteriology in the University of British Columbia. Finding himself in Toronto with time on his hands and ideas in his head, Dr. Hill proceeded to the Canadian Health Congress and made a speech, viewing with alarm the ancient and malignant custom of shaking hands. I Few people may have noticed it, but I hands make excellent roosting places for I bacteria, bugs, microbes, germs and other I pests, comments P. VV. Luce, writing in j a Canadian paper on Professor Hill's I alarming statements. A casual handshake between friends gets these bugs hopelessly mixed up, to the great endangerment of health. The bugs get very much annoyed and bite the hand that feeds them. Result: Disaster, disease and death stalking up and down the land. Dr. Hill has very kindly multiplied the population of the United States and Canada by the number of microbes known to be residing on hands north of Mexico, doing this tremendous work in his own time and making a generous deduction for one-armed men. His figures prove that an average hand supports 9328 full-grown and 33,297 baby microbes per cubic centimeter, and the reason there are not more is that these take up all the available space. These microbes are able, and very willing, to spread all the latest styles of disease. They are devilishly active when the even tenor of their existence has been disturbed by a vigorous handshake, which is one reason why so many friends of the party feel so sick the day after election. The insidious thing about manutosis (bacteria on the hands) is that you, yourself, seldom know you have it! Your friends may shun you and your relatives keep their distance, but unlese some little child blurts out the distressing truth, you are likely to remain in ignorance of your appalling condition. You might go through life scattering bugs right and left and never be any the wiser. Or, worse still, imagine yourself realising the monstrous enormity of your heinous offence and weeping over these entries in your diary:— April 16.—Met Bill Potts. Shook hands heartily. April 20.—8i1l Potts died of distemper. Shook hands with Jerry McGuire. April 23.—Jerry McGuire died of housemaid's knee. Shook hands with Pete Prune. April 26. —Pete Prune suffering from hives. Shook hands with Mike Rophone. April 29.—Mike Rophone attacked by blues and taken to Isolation Hospital. April 30.—Arrested by health inspector. What have I done! What have I done!

One way to avoid such tragedies is to refuse to shake a hand unless it is hygienic. If you should meet your rich uncle on his way to amend his will, be firm! Look the old fellow squarely in the eye, and say: "No, uncle. 1 cannot shake hands with you! Your fingers are dripping microbes! Your nails have not been manicured for a month. You are a menace to the human race. You breed bugs by the billion. You . . ." There will be no need to say more. Your rich uncle will have moved on by then, firmly clutching in his dirty hand the dollar he is going to leave you in his wilL In business, too, take no more chances. Assuming you are one of those talkative salesmen who has been in the habit of proffering a moist palm to your prospects, do so no more. Reform! Beware of bacteria! When you have forced your way into the private office and cleared the papers off your victim's desk, get busy. Unhook the aluminium basin from under your coat-tails, slip the rubber bottle filled with distilled water from behind your shirt front, take the medicated soap and the prophylactic brush out of your vest pocket, then seize the prospect's right hand and ecrub it red and raw. When the microbes are routed, dry the hand I and dust it with talcum powder, then proclaim: '"Delighted to meet you, sir, and proud indeed to shake your clean hand!" You will find this system a wonderful help in bringing the interview to a rapid conclusion.