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Just in time for summer, the Times has brought the fear to the park, where an army of infectious organisms await anyone reckless enough to let the grass touch their bare feet. According to a number of very uptight dermatologists, taking off your shoes in the park is pretty much akin to soaking them in a bucket of bacteria.
Dermatologist Judith Hellman gave the paper ten good reasons why Richard Gere should have used a stunt double for his barefoot park scene in Pretty Woman. The risks include fire ants, bromhidrosi infection (“stinky feet”), and the tendency for plantar warts and athlete’s foot to spread from one bare foot to the next, via grass.
Moist grass is the biggest danger because bacteria thrives in water and strolling barefoot through it when wet can damage the skin’s natural barrier, allowing infectious organisms to sink in or take up residency in your shoes. Dermatologist Giuseppe Militello advises thoroughly drying your feet after walking on grass. Parks commissioner Adrian Benepe, on the other hand, seems to think these eggheads are overreacting: “Doctors are going to be cautious; that’s the nature of doctors.” He’s always allowed his children to go barefoot in the park, and they’re doing fine… so far.
Photo courtesy Urch.
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Seriously? The level of hysteria prevalent in this culture is just staggering.
Just another example of the media trying to scare people.
I knew this stupid thing was going to appear also on gothamist... sheez!
Uh...the Digg calls the main page is doing is making this site prohibitively slow.
if jesus is allowing this to happen then I'm cool with it.
Life is a sexually contracted disease that is 100% fatal!
Agreed Al_Fredo. Whatever Digg plugin you guys are using, knock it off. I didn't visit the site all weekend because it was causing my computer to hang forever.
In a new report conducted by the "people who think for themselves", listening to this main-stream-media will cause Cancer.
Awesome! They should try seeing how much bacteria thrives on the sidewalks and the soles of everyone's shoes at the end of the day, that way NO ONE will step outside EVER!
I'll give you another reason not to walk barefoot in central park: the rats!!!! They're running around all over the place! You're walking around on their bathroom! If that isn't enough to keep your flip flops on, I don't know what is!
Anywhere a dog might defecate is definitely a poor place to stroll barefoot, but barefoot in the grass is one of life's little pleasures.
People need to stop wearing sandals in the city.
Grazing in the grass is a gas, baby can you diiiiig it?
On a related note, how do chicks wear those tiny little open shoes all summer long where their feet are barely a quarter inch from the ground? I love sexy open heels on a hot chick as much as anyone, but by the end of the day you see a lot of dirty feet around the city.
Why would anyone walk barefoot on grass when there is so much pavement around?
Whatever did people do for millions of years before we invented shoes?
Fucking morans.
To AntB,
Before we invented shoes, a lot of parasites such as hookworms get into human body through our own barefoot. That's why in ancient days, human has much shorter life spans. We just started to live much longer for most of us since 1950s.
Besides, don't forget before we invented shoes, our skin in our feet is callous to protect us. While your feet now spend most of its life in shoes, the skin is soft and easier to be penetrated by invaders.
Finally, it is morons, not morans
Heh, people died at 30, that's what they did!
Check out the New York Magazine piece on being barefoot (April 28/08); it poses an interesting take on ditching your shoes.
There's another "dermatologist" who runs a website devoted to "bare, succulent, naked feet swathed in thick,quivering, sensuous grass". So obviously, there's some disagreement about this among their peers.
eugenejen: spelling it "moran" is a fairly well-known internet joke.
As a practicing Infectious Disease specialist i'm always amused when there is a "breaking story" by the media about the emergence of some infection or other that has been around for ages. I remember when MRSA (resistant form of Staph infection) was being hyped as "deadly" recently in the news leading people to panic. It's one of the most common infections around.
Development of resistance by organisms is definitely an issue epidemiologically but It's important to keep in mind that bacteria/virus/fungi are around everywhere and our bodies do a pretty good job of protecting us.
And remember to wash always with soap and water! A simple way to prevent plenty of infections.
But you can't wash *all* of the grass.