The article on sponges really did enlighten me. I have been living in an apartment for two years with three other roommates and not once considered the amount of bacteria that accumated on the sponge. I did some research on this as we have used at most two sponges in the two years we have been living together.

A research article titled Food Safety: Kitchen Clean Up, Susie Craig from Washington State University wrote that in just a couple of drops of liquid from the sponge there were about ten million units of disease causing bacteria. Some of the bacteria found included Escherichia Coli, Pseudomonas, Salmonella, and staphylococcus. Damp sponges drying in air allow a great environment for bacterial survival. The Washington University team of researched found that bacteria in that type of environment can survive up to two days. Studies have shown that dishwashing liquid barely has anyeffect on the amount yeast, mold, Pseudomonas, and E. Coli present on ]household sponges. However, dishwashing liquid can decrease the number of Salmonella bacteria on the sponge.