When should you throw away dish brushes?

Keeping track of all the things I need to keep clean in my apartment often feels like a chore of its own.

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I try to remember when I first started using a new sponge so that I can replace it in a respectable amount of time, but I&#;ll be honest: The last sponge I threw out lived in my kitchen sink for a really long time.

You can imagine my surprise when Diana Ciechorska, general manager at Park Slope Cleaning, a commercial and industrial cleaning service in New York and Miami, said kitchen sponges need to be replaced every one to two weeks. &#;They come into frequent contact with food particles and moisture, which can lead to bacterial buildup.&#;

Mause Ramirez, owner of MCS Cleaning Services Inc., a professional home and commercial cleaning business in San Francisco since , said even when sponges look clean, they can be harboring bacteria, and you should be cleaning them after every single use. Ciechorska recommends microwaving damp sponges for 1 to 2 minutes or throwing them in the dishwasher to clean them.

Steel wool scrubbers can rust, so she says to rinse them well after each use and allow them to air-dry completely. &#;Replace every few weeks or when worn, as they can leave behind metal fibers.&#;

According to Ciechorska, dish brushes don&#;t need to be replaced as frequently, about every three to four months, depending on the state of the brush&#;s bristles. She recommends soaking brushes in hot water and cleaning vinegar (a more acidic vinegar than distilled white vinegar) or cleaning them with a mild disinfectant to keep them clean in between uses.

Bottle brushes and brushes used to clean straws are softer than dish brushes, so Ciechorska says replacing these every one to two months is recommended. To clean them, she rinses them thoroughly with hot, soapy water after each use and soaks them once a week in a mix of water and cleaning vinegar or runs them through the dishwasher (if they&#;re dishwasher-safe).

I&#;ve significantly reduced my paper towel usage after buying a 12-pack of microfiber towels to rotate in my kitchen, but it&#;s an extra load of laundry I have to do every week.

I usually wash them in cold water like I wash all my other clothes, but this water temperature is likely not enough to get them totally clean. James Rogers, PhD, CR&#;s director of food safety research and testing, cleans kitchen cloths in the washing machine using hot water. Ciechorska says you shouldn&#;t use fabric softener in these loads so the towels don&#;t lose their absorbency.

Even with regular washing, they need to be replaced when they start to wear out or lose their absorbency, according to Ramirez. Ciechorska says it depends on how well they are maintained, but they should be replaced with new ones usually every six to 12 months.

The last time I reached for my rubber gloves to wash dishes, I found that the thumb on my right hand had a huge hole in it. Ramirez and Ciechorska both recommend replacing rubber gloves when they begin to show any signs of wear (something I didn&#;t do). Even if there are no holes in your gloves, if you notice any funky smells, it&#;s time to replace them, too, according to Ramirez.

&#;Rubber gloves can be cleaned with warm, soapy water and hung to dry between uses,&#; says Ciechorska.

I used to believe that my toilet brush was being cleaned as I cleaned my toilet bowl, but this isn&#;t the case. According to the cleaning experts we spoke with, toilet brushes still need to be cleaned after each use and disinfected regularly. To clean your toilet brush, Ramirez recommends swishing the brush in the toilet bowl with a cleaning solution and allowing it to air-dry. 

Ciechorska&#;s toilet brush disinfecting routine requires just two ingredients, water and bleach. &#;To disinfect a toilet brush, I recommend filling a bucket with a disinfecting solution&#;like one part bleach to 10 parts water&#;and letting the brush soak for 10 to 15 minutes. After soaking, rinse it well with hot water and let it air-dry completely.&#; Even with regular cleaning and disinfection, toilet brushes need to be replaced when they show any signs of wear or every six to 12 months, according to Ciechorska. 

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If you don&#;t clean your cleaning tools regularly, you&#;re just spreading dirt around your home instead of cleaning. With regular cleaning, some tools can also last longer before they need to be replaced, but they still need to be replaced sooner rather than later.

&#;The secret is to keep [them] clean and dry, like a good painter washes his brushes after every work is done,&#; Ramirez says. Items that are regularly wet or in contact with food, like sponges, dish brushes, and mopheads, need more frequent cleaning and replacing. Lastly, throw away that dish brush, broom, or microfiber towel when it starts to look frayed or otherwise worn down.

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I don&#;t know about you, but I throw my sponges away on the regular. It&#;s not necessarily because I&#;m worried about bacteria&#;it&#;s the smell that bothers me. The smell of an old sponge really creeps me out, and the odors seem to linger on my hands after I use it. No, thank you. I&#;m all about buying an industrial pack of sponges at Costco or Amazon and tossing them when they get stinky.

(Psst: Have you tried using microfiber cloths? They can remove 99% of bacteria with just water!)

Recent media reports are exposing the dangers of the common kitchen sponge and they say it goes beyond the odor. By the time you can smell it, your sponge is already a bacteria warehouse. They may have over exaggerated the dangers (comparing kitchen sponges to toilets!), but truth of the matter is that dish cloths, sponges and scrub brushes do harbor bacteria that can cause food-borne illness. To avoid any potential contamination, you should probably replace them &#;regularly&#; and clean them in between&#;but how often is often enough?

When Should You Replace Your Sponges and Scrub Brushes?

According to a study in the journal of Scientific Reports, you should replace your sponges every week. Before you get on that regimen, take a minute to first consider how you&#;re using them. If you only use your dish cloths or sponges to suds-up already rinsed dishes, you can probably sanitize them once a week (see below) and replace them when they begin to fall apart. On the other hand, if those scrub brushes and sponges are regularly contaminated with raw meat juices, the once-a-week rule probably stands.

If you don&#;t want to spend too much on replacement sponges, consider having a different cleaning item for each application. For example, I use my scrub brush to remove built-in grime from baking sheets, pots and pans. It gets dirty more quickly than my sponges, but since I never use it as the final cleaner I hang on to it for longer than a week. I have sponges that are specifically used to soap-up already scrubbed dishes and separate sponges that I use (and toss frequently) for cleaning items that had contact with raw meat.

Can&#;t stand the thought of having multiple sponges? That&#;s OK&#;you can extend the life of your sponge by cleaning it at least every other day.

How to Clean Your Sponges

According to the Public Health and Safety Organization, dish cloths can be cleaned using the sanitize setting of your washing machine, but the easiest way to clean a sponge is in the microwave. It won&#;t work for any metallic sponges like steel wool, but simply wet the sponge and pop it in the microwave for 2 minutes. The microwave will heat the water to boiling and kill 99.9 percent of bacteria. Just make sure you let it cool down before handling it again!

Another good option is the dishwasher. Studies show that dishwashers are one of the most effective killers of bacteria, and it&#;s easy to get into a routine if you run your dishwasher every day anyway. Just pop your sponges and scrub brushes on the top rack before you run the cycle. Make sure to have the heated drying option turned on to maximize the temperature inside the dishwasher. (Hey, is your dishwasher clean?)

Finally, you can soak your sponges. This option is especially effective if you do it every day. You get to choose&#;a solution of 3/4 cup bleach in one gallon of water or a bowl filled with full-strength vinegar, which works wonders in so many cleaning projects. After soaking for 5 minutes, 99 percent of bacteria will be eliminated from the sponge. Be sure to squeeze out excess water and let the sponges air dry completely after soaking.

No matter which method you choose, you can always follow the &#;when in doubt, toss it out&#; adage. It&#;s definitely not worth getting someone sick over a dollar or two.

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