How clean is your pool?

This is gross. So, sorry. But we went for a swim at a friend’s place the other night and the water was looking a little green. I asked him if his filter was working and he told me that they were having some issues, but that it was still probably cleaner than a public pool.

Interesting. So I began looking at some stats on my tablet that night while I waited for sleep to hit me. I was a little disturbed and so, it took a little longer to fall asleep. But here is what I found.

6% of people who have been in public pools, read that as any pool that is given access by a general population, admit that they have swam while having a cold. 11% admit that they have swam with a runny nose. 70% say that they don’t shower before entering a pool and that may explain the 50% of pools that have traces of human fecal matter in them. Ick, right?

“It looks clean” is not good enough sometime

But, wait, what about the chlorine used to keep public places clean? That’s a great question. Lets talk chemistry. When Chlorine is combined with Uric acid (yes, everyone does pee in the pool), two dangerous gases are given off: Cyanogen Chloride and Nitrogen Trichloramine. Both are skin irritants, and can affect the lungs and even the heart negatively. A study out of Purdue U, explains that these gaseous byproducts are the reason that our eyes burn when in pools. So what most pool managers do is …wait for it….add more chlorine.

Bromine is also used in some pools and similar byproducts are given off, but it is way more expensive. So most public pools still rely on chlorine.

Now is that enough to stop me from swimming? No. I also let my kids swim in public pools all the time. In fact, my kids learned to swim in a pool program that we trusted. Not only were the instructors good but they took their pool maintenance pretty seriously. I never had burning eyes and we were in that water a lot. (See Madison Swim Academy). But we have also been in several hotels that were not as good. One place in Illinois had my eyes burning without even getting in the water.

So I guess it’s up to us to keep an eye out for good clean pools for our kids. But remember that when you smell strong chlorine, it’s because the pool is giving off gas made from people waste. Make good decisions, stay healthy.

We use green chemicals to clean our gym. Our mats are sanitized weekly and our gym not only cleans the floors, mats, and equipment, we spend a lot to clean our air. The musty gym smell comes from odor holding dust that accumulates on ceilings, and structures that we cannot reach. But rest assured that Gymfinity is clean and safe; it’s what we want for our kids. It’s what we want for your kids too.

See also: Our gym page at Gymfinity.com