The next time you head to the soft play centre with your kids, you may what to steer clear of the ball pit area. Whilst parents chit chat, kids running around full of adrenaline, the ball pit with its thousands of soft plastic balls, are keeping a rather murky secret. A new study has found these pits are some of the filthiest places for children to play, and are teeming with thousands of germs. Yuck!
The bacteria discovered in ball pits, by a research team from the University of North Georgia, can cause a range of deadly diseases from pneumonia and sepsis to meningitis and bladder infections.
One would hope that those who work in a soft play area would clean all areas well. But the reality, however, is that there are more germs in a ball pit that there are on a toilet seat. Yuck!
Ball pits are super yucky. They are filthy health hazards that should come with a serious health warning attached. It would be great to think that staff members were clean each and every ball and surface of a soft play area but, more often than none this isn’t the case. I understand that cleaning loads of plastic balls is no easy task, but considering the amount of children who are touching the balls, who may have illnesses, snotty noses or other germs, it makes you wonder why you don’t have a ball pit home to save yourself the idea of your child playing in those areas!
We hardly going to soft play areas anymore, not so much because of reasons stated in this post, but now that the sun is out, hefty dose of fresh air, running around in the park or building a sandcastle on the beach, it’s far more entertaining to my toddler and sitting in a hot sweaty soft play area.
Missy, Me & Him 