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Comment by jcadam | Hacker News Reader

I get the flu shot every year (I have asthma - otherwise healthy), and have only had the flu a few times in my life. This year, with all of the stories of healthy adults being felled by flu has me nervous.

Bah, my germophobic ways (I avoid touching door handles, my face holes, etc.) will hopefully protect me. Except maybe from those jack-holes who need to prove how 'hard' they are by coming to work with a fever. You know who they are because not only do they look like shit, they make sure to announce to everyone that they're sick so that they get 'credit.'

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I have integrated the same set of countermeasures[1] in my life for the last ten years or so. And do not consider them in any way phobic. They have reduced my rate rates of infection to exactly zero.

I shall step up my defense level an extra notch or two if a serious pan- or epidemic comes around. Some will chide me for squeemishness, but really, I find not sticking my fingers in my mouth an acceptable price for a markedly reduced risk of illness and death.

[1] Shopping trolleys and baskets considered harmful

So what are those countermeasures? Do you wipe down everything you touch when you go shopping?

Simple stuff.

Maintain a flag: Did I touch some probably disgusting surface [trolley/phone/mouse/keyboard/door handle/seat/other people/whatever]? If so, do not touch mouth/nose/eyes/wounds/food until hand properly washed.

Is some idiot coughing or sneezing his heart out? Shut my fuck up and breath through the nose.

Consider everything brought home from supermarket to have potentially contaminated surfaces (checkout-conveyors are disgusting).

That kind of thing. Really just a question of habit. Not in any way going Howard Hughes. I once had a girlfriend who did that (going slightly bonkers from studying medicine (but fine today, and a practicing doctor, better for the experience)), and am well aware of the danger signs.

I used to be very much not a germaphobe. Then I started riding public transit and was endlessly sick for months at a time. I implemented your exact regimine. Lo and behold, I can now go years without getting a cold.

No arguing with those results.

Forget it if you ever have a kid. I used to do the exact same as you, but realized it was impossible to keep it up after having a kid. Unless you’re willing to wash your hands literally every five minutes.

Having brought up a child as a single parent, I am perhaps not a perfect fit for that lecture.

When you have children everything changes. Then your success depends on teaching them to adhere to the same countermeasures—there isn’t much chance of that until they are older.

I had managed not to throw up for 20 years. That all went out the window when I had a child that attended school.

Same here. ...and while I can teach some basics to my 4 year old, there is absolutely nothing I can do about my 2 year old in daycare.

Actually I do have 3 kids, and I used to be sick all the time when my kids were little.

But now that my youngest is 12, things are much better and I rarely get sick :)

I also get the flu shot every year but I always catch the flu.

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