Foot to Mouth Precautions

Jim Banholzer

In dire need of a dentist, I found myself hesitating, after hearing some horror tales from three separate hygienists of proper cleaning methods not being utilized at some Idaho dentist operating rooms. If the hygienist’s tales of hasty substandard cleaning methods were true (as I believe they are), this would naturally result in a high potential for transference of communicable diseases in between patients.

I e-mailed these jawbone questions over to the South Central Idaho Health District, seeking if they kept records of which dental practitioners have & have not been proven to use proper cleaning methods. Further, I asked them if the Idaho Health Department ever conducts spot-check inspections to ensure the public that proper cleaning procedures are being utilized on regular basis’s within local dentist operating rooms. Or is it the health department’s policy to allow dentists to police themselves regarding this crucial cleanliness crusade, until someone first complains?

I haven’t heard back from the Health Department yet, but after reading this story in today’s Statesman about this law providing lack of accountability for police or the State Health Department’s industrial hygienists at houses contaminated by meth, I think that I can easily guess what their answer will be.

If it’s a budget problem that we have, I would like to suggest a low cost solution to this insidious problem under the light of the examination table. There seems to be a plentiful amount of patriotic Government foot inspector’s at every airport entrance. Instead of dedicating so many of our precious funds to imagn’d threats in the sky, why don’t we transfer some common horse sense to this more down to earth danger and begin cross-training these devoted surplussed sentries to protecting us from misplaced diseases and poisons openly dripping in the bibs right under our very chins?