What Is Taint Analysis and Why Should I Care?

He covered a wet, hacking cough with his hand, then pushed through the door of the ward. I reached the same door and hesitated. The Cougher had just tainted the door with his germs. If I touched it, I’d be tainted too.

These days we all know what germs are and how they’re passed from person to person, and from hand to door to hand. The fact is that particularly in cold and flu season you have to regard every doorknob, and every elevator button as suspicious. You always wash your hands afterward, because you never know which doorknob is tainted with germs. You have to assume they all are.