Toothbrush Sterilizers: The Good, the Bad and the Unprecedented

I'll buy just about any gadget as long as the cool-factor is high enough. The electric razor, for instance, is cool. It leaves my face smooth, has a nice, satisfying buzz, so I know it's working hard, plus, it cleans itself. The automatic coffee maker is cool too. It's great waking up to a fresh, hot pot of coffee in the morning. iPod, cool. Remote controlled everything-cool. That new handle tool for carrying 5 bags of groceries in one hand? Cool! (Yeah, it really works.) I wish I got one ages ago.

But I tend to resist new gadgets before giving in to them, like the electric toothbrush. Where's the coolness in that? How hard is it to brush your teeth? Then manual toothbrushes started getting to be 5 and 6 dollars apiece, so I gave in. For under 10 bucks-with the rotating replacement heads an additional 6 dollars (for a package of 2), and AA batteries dirt cheap when you buy in bulk-I figured I'd try it. I found the electric brush had a nice satisfying buzz, just like my razor, and my dentist still happily reported no cavities. Also, my first 10-dollar electric brush lasted over 3 years before finally giving out. Okay, I decided, the electric toothbrush is cool.

Then, while browsing Target for interesting new toys, I came across a display of ultraviolet toothbrush sterilizers, and I thought, "could that be the cool new thing?"

Okay, I Admit It...

I'm not an early adopter. I resisted the idea of this new UV toothbrush sterilizer. As far as I knew, mankind had been using toothbrushes for hundreds of years without any fatal toothbrush epidemics breaking out. Still, I investigated. The literature told how millions of microorganisms contaminate our toothbrush, and how important it is to eliminate them before they cause serious illness. They said UV light killed 99.9% of the bacteria hiding in the bristles of your toothbrush. Okay, I'll believe that.

But still, something bothered me. Why not just soak the toothbrush in antiseptic mouthwash? Doesn't that kill 99.9% of the germs, too? And how could I justify spending $20, $30, or even $50 dollars that some of those UV devices cost? It just didn't seem cool enough yet.

But Consider The UV Light

Admittedly, toothbrush sterilizers do look cool with their soft glow, housed in a tall container, some of which stand and some that lie down. And the auto-timer that lightly bathes toothbrush bristles in a soothing blue light for a scientifically calculated length of time and then shuts itself off seems pretty cool. That's got to count for something.

I was on the fence.

Then I realized we're supposed to change our toothbrushes at least once every 3 months. It says right on the back of all toothbrush packaging. Bristles break down over time, and need to be replaced. So irradiating bacteria in our toothbrushes wasn't going to help them last longer. Toothbrush instructions also said not to store them in a closed container, but that they should be air-dried. Things just weren't adding up. So I went to the CDC website (Center for Disease Control) to see if there had ever been a toothbrush epidemic somewhere, and that maybe these devices had been developed to address just that problem.

The Good News

There's no evidence to support any ill health effects from the normal use of toothbrushes. The CDC website even went so far as to say that cleaning in a dishwasher, microwaving, and ultraviolet sterilization may be damaging to the toothbrush.

The bad news in all of this is the unprecedented use of fear to sell an unnecessary device. Perhaps someone out there can justify the coolness factor, and the last thing I want to do is dissuade anybody from purchasing something they think is cool. But the tactics used for selling this product? Pretty uncool.