Why you shouldn’t use toilet paper to clean bumbum

Doctors warn that toilet paper does little to remove feces and the United States is one country that hasn’t improved its sanitation when wiping.
While countries such as Japan, Italy and Greece use bidets in the toilets as a way to keep the anus clean, the US and *Nigeria* has mostly relied on toilet paper as the norm to keep that area clean.

But doctors say excessive wiping could cause health problems such as
anal fissures and urinary tract infections.

Though the suggestion may sound absurd, celebrities such as will.i.am, Will Smith and Terrence Howard have been vouching for baby wipes instead of tissue for years – with Smith even hailing the habit as ‘special and incredible’. (Especially wet baby wipes)

Rose George, author of The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters, told Tonic why using toilet paper doesn’t remove feces like it should.

‘I find it rather baffling that millions of people are walking around with dirty anuses while thinking they are clean,’ George said. ‘Toilet paper moves sh*t, but it doesn’t remove it.’

Will.i.am said in a past interview with Elle Magazine that baby wipes are what most people should consider using in terms of wiping.

‘Here’s proof on why people should have baby wipes. Get some chocolate, wipe it on a wooden floor, and then try to get it up with some dry towels. You’re going to get chocolate in the cracks. That’s why you gotta get them baby wipes,’ will.i.am said.

Actor Terrence Howard went as far as to say in an Elle Magazine interview that he didn’t trust women who used toilet paper.

‘If they’re using dry paper, they aren’t washing all of themselves. It’s just unclean. So if I go in a woman’s house and see the toilet paper there, I’ll explain this,’ Howard said.

 -Mailonline

As pooing expert Rose George explained to Tonic, dry toilet paper doesn’t work to clean dirt – it just moves it around. ‘I find it rather baffling that millions of people are walking around with dirty anuses while thinking they are clean,’ says Rose. ‘Toilet paper moves sh*t, but it doesn’t remove it. ‘You wouldn’t shower with a dry towel; why do you think that dry toilet paper cleans you?’

Fair point. Imagine trying to remove makeup with just a dry bit of paper. You’d just end up smearing it all over your face. Not only that, but you’d hurt your skin by scrubbing away with something scratchy – and the same applies to the delicate skin around your bum and genitals. The friction of rubbing away with dry toilet paper can lead to irritation, injury, and even anal fissures (that’s a tear in the lining of the rectum, and it’s as grim as it sounds) and hemorrhoids. If your wiping technique isn’t up to scratch you could also end up getting a urinary tract infection. If you’re wiping back to front instead of front to back, you could be moving bacteria from the anus to your urethra. Anyone who’s had a UTI will know that they are to be avoided at all costs (the pain, the anguish. We don’t want to talk about it). Basically, we’re moving bacteria around with something rough and dry, rather than actually killing bacteria, cleaning our skin, and being gentle on our buttholes. Not great. The ideal methods of cleaning your butt post-poop are, then, the use of a bidet or wet wipes.
These actually help you to clean your butt rather than just ineffectually moving the poo around. As Tonic notes, more than 90% of homes in Spain, Italy, and Greece have a bidet, while around 60% of homes in Japan have fancy loos with features such as spraying your bum with water and air-drying it. Us schmucks in the UK still faffing about with toilet paper are quite far behind in the bum-cleaning game. Of course, there are some issues holding us back from elevating our toilet habits. Upgrading to a bidet can be pricey, while the use of wet wipes has environmental implications. Many wipes that claim to be flushable can still struggle to break down, causing blockages.