There have been some strange rumours spreading during this Covid-19 pandemic.
In Malaysia, for instance, rumours spread that the coronavirus will make you act like a zombie. Sounds irrational right? Well, their health ministry actually had to come out and publicly dismiss it, saying in a tweet: “The claim that individuals infected with this virus will behave like zombies is not true … Patients can recover.”
And in America, some Trump supporters have been encouraging people to drink bleach to ward off the coronavirus. Obviously, drinking bleach will do absolutely nothing except poison you.
While these rumours are easy to dismiss, not all are. For instance, how sure are you that you’ve not been unknowingly spreading Covid-19 this whole time by farting?
Can Farts Transmit Covid-19?
Silent farts are often described as silent killers, because one whiff of a particularly bad one can make you feel like you’re drowning in an ocean of sewage.
But can farts also carry a deadly virus?
We all know that the coronavirus can spread through poop, as Covid-19 patients shed fragments of the virus in their faeces, which can be detected in wastewater.
But now, the question of whether it can spread through wind passed from your butts has experts divided.
Not A Usual Transmission Route
According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of Tongzhou district in Beijing, farts, normally, do not constitute another transmission route of Covid-19.
Unless someone takes a good and rather close sniff of gas from a pantless patient, they said.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t usually sniff the farts of strangers when I’m outside.
So, unless you live in an area of Singapore where people regularly stick their heads near the butts of naked strangers to inhale their farts, there shouldn’t be a problem.
Reader: Time to move out of Yishun
Better To Be Safe
However, Dr Normal Swan, a Scottish Australian physician, believes people should stop farting near one another to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
He added it was everyone’s responsibility not to pass wind close to another person and “that you don’t fart with your bottom bare”.
I’ve never heard of people pulling their pants down to let their farts out while in public but if you do this often, please stop.
Even though there’s no evidence to support the claim that farts can transmit the virus, Dr Swan says that people are already wearing protective clothing like pants and underwear that prevents transmission.
Think of it as a mask for your butt.
“We wear a mask that covers our farts all the time,” Dr Swan said. I’m sure when Dr Swan started his medical career he never thought he’d utter such a sentence, but this Covid-19 pandemic has made all of us do and say things we normally wouldn’t.
Extra Precautions
In addition to always wearing underwear and pants, we should also flush the toilet with the lid closed, because of a “toilet plume phenomenon”, according to The Conversation.
This phenomenon refers to how flushing a toilet causes up to 145,000 aerosolised droplets to be disturbed and thrown around the room, and become suspended in the air for hours.
Reader: That’s why I never flush
You never flushed even before the Covid-19 pandemic.
Reader: Touche
Closing the toilet lid is particularly recommended in public toilets, where the poop bacteria of a thousand strangers are waiting to get acquainted with you.
The Bottom Line
Geddit? Bottom?
Reader: Why do I even read your articles?
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Anyway, the bottom line is that while there’s no concrete evidence that farts can spread the coronavirus, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
Reader: Does this mean that we should stop farting forever?
What? Of course not. How would you even- no. What we should do is always wear underwear and pants when leaving our homes.
And whether or not farts can carry the virus, you really shouldn’t be farting near people anyway.
