via “ScienceDump”:https://www.sciencedump.com/content/take-your-festival-wristband-its-basically-germ-colony

The folks over at ScienceDump have posted the findings of a study done by Dr. Allison Cottell, a microbiologist at the University of Surrey, who analyzed the bacteria on festival wristbands.

Cottell concluded that the cloth of festival wristbands is capable of attracting more than twenty times the bacteria on clothes. She notes that she studied two wristbands that one person had been wearing for two years and found there “to be a concentration of around 9,000 micrococci and 2,000 staphylococci bacteria on them,” an “exceedingly high amount” compared to bacteria found on people’s skin.

“Staphylococci are usually harmless although they can cause boils and infections of cuts and grazes, and can also cause a form of acute food poisoning if they are ingested,” Cottell said. “It would be advisable not to wear them if working in industries such as healthcare or food preparation, where there is a risk that the bacteria may spread to other people.”