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===starts=== A Clean Cruise Get the dirt on cabin condition
our ship may look immaculate, but it may not be.
I don't consider myself particularly fetishistic about things hygienic, but I always have wondered about the cleanliness of the coverlets on beds in cabins.
During some recent cruises, I asked a hotel manager here or a stewardess there: "How often do you actually wash those bedspreads that look so neat as a pin when we arrive in our cabin on embarkation day?" The answers weren't pretty.
The hotel manager on a Holland America ship told me, "When they obviously need it." Crew members and staff on many other ships echo this not-very-comforting news about comforters. A cabin steward on Crown Cruise Line's Crown Dynasty, for example, said the bedspreads are washed for passengers "in the suites, once each cruise; but in regular cabins, only about once a month." I don't know about you, but following my it's-better-to-be-safe-than-sorry rule, I generally prefer to put as much distance between me and those bedcovers as possible. I feel the same way in hotels.
If you're on a jihad against germs, a helpful little gadget can tell you more than you ever may want to know about the health of your ship's cabin. The lightweight, portable tool — called the RestAssured Personal Inspection Light, or PIL — is an ultraviolet-light germ detector that purports to be truly effective in scoping out everything from food stains and grime to body fluids on bed linens. The PIL can detect an armada of shmutz: body deposits, organic contamination, fecal matter and bacterial growth — even salmonella and E. coli.
The battery-operated gizmo uses the same technology — UV black-light phosphorescence — that police use at crime scenes to find dried body fluids or that your vet might use to run across your pet to detect ringworm. The offending deposits fluoresce in a range of hues and shapes. A saliva stain, for example, will appear as a gray shadow with a dark ring. In fact, among the PIL's myriad uses, you can even detect counterfeit currency or check your kids' heads for lice eggs.
Sound neurotic? Maybe.
But according to Joseph Schulman, founder of Mobility Solutions, the New Jersey-based company that developed and manufactures the gadget, it is an ideal tool when housekeeping practices are in question.
"Even the finer institutions don't readily change the bedspreads," he says.
Schulman is serious about germ warfare. His company does commercial janitorial work, and he calls himself "the germ guy for Fox Television news." "Whenever they have a story on germs in the environment, they call me," he says.
Hard-to-see grime in bathrooms is on Schulman's most-wanted list. Your cabin steward, for instance, might first swab the toilet, and then use the same equipment to clean the sink, he says.
And Schulman shared tidbits such as these about those bedspreads: "Most prominent on them is urine and semen. On pillowcases, you'll find saliva or mucus from sneezing." The PIL kit sells for $34.95, and includes the light, a waterless anti-microbial sanitizer and a ready-to-use disinfectant cleaner.
RestAssured also makes an arsenal of similar gadgets for bigger jobs. One resembles a miniature bug zapper; another a gigantic magnifying glass.
For more information, call 1-877-811-7378; on the Web, check restassured.com
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
Original Publication Date: 08/13/2000
===ends===
Terry Donegan
Doubtlessly this device may be of interest to some, but I think getting sick has an awful lot more to do with what one eats and drinks and failing to wash one's hands than catching something from a bedspread or chair. There are too many phobias in this world as it is!
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