Toilet Brush Warning Wins Consumer Award

ABC News reports that Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch has awarded a $500 first prize to Ed Gyetvai, who submitted a wacky consumer warning label to its contest to find the wackiest. The label on a toilet brush said: "Do not use for personal hygiene."

The contest sponsor's contention is that such common sense warnings are only needed because, without them, consumers would file even more frivolous lawsuits. This, of course, means that we really, really need lawsuit reform.

Whatever.

What I'm thinking is that some of the "common sense" warning labels we see these days have more to do with consumer ignorance rather than either a lack of common sense or a burning desire to file lawsuits. Why else would my gynecologist inform me prior to a hysterectomy that I would not be able to have children after the removal of my reproductive organs?

I almost laughed when he said that--and then I realized that some women know so little about their own bodies that some women might not actually know that a uterus is where the buns are baked, so to speak. That is not a condemnation of ignorant women but a condemnation of an educational system--and culture--which shies away from presenting accurate scientific information about reproduction in the part of the system where most people get all the education they're gonna get: high school.

As for the toilet brush warning, I'm also thinking that the general public is generally far too ignorant about infection control and disease transmission. If the human body weren't so effective at fighting off infection, there likely wouldn't be any humans around today. The next time you go buy a taco, check to see if the person adding the lettuce just got through making change at the cash register--without washing her hands or donning gloves before touching the lettuce. Or try forcing yourself to eat a hamburger at McDonald's in LaGrange after seeing one of the clean up crew clear a table with a broom. How clean is your kitchen counter? And did you just add sugar to your cereal with that spoon you just picked up off the counter?

If you already know that something is dangerous, you don't need the warning. Me, I just gave myself a voltage meter for Christmas. I'm reading the instructions--and the full page of warnings included with the meter. Someone else might think some of them silly, basic, and "common sense." All I know about electricity is how to flip a switch and how to make a circuit (yes, I can connect the phone to the answering machine to the computer to the phone jack). I'm pretty sure there's more to it than that.

And lawsuit reform? Why don't we just give our bank account numbers and passwords to the insurance companies and be done with it?