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Physical activity has become a social need neatly interwoven into the daily lifestyle of the average individual. While health is the top priority, achieving it may not be as simple as merely walking the treadmill or lifting weights in the fitness centre. A clean gym environment is also essential for human health and well-being. Gyms being high traffic areas – with people constantly dropping in and out throughout the day - hygiene becomes especially important.
Over recent years, the popularity of health and fitness-based recreation has soared. We now have more fitness centres in the Middle East than ever before with many of us paying for annual memberships. Fitness centres are attended by a lot of people who use gym equipment that often becomes the medium of transmission of diseases. It is generally accepted that cleanliness has always been amongst the leading reasons for people to select a club. And, maintaining a clean and healthy facility is a benefit to members and employees alike, leading to increased club revenue for those facilities that place a high priority on getting it right.
Hygiene hazards
The sheer volume of members using a fitness facility on a daily basis warrants the need and importance of strict hygiene standards. Given the high humidity in the Gulf as well as high temperatures and human traffic, gyms become breeding grounds for respiratory, skin and gastrointestinal infections. The industry is also unique in that its customers make physical contact with the equipment, unlike a supermarket or other businesses rendering high footfalls. Where there are many hand-contact surfaces and damp, warm conditions, the risk of cr osscontamination is magnified further. Determining the concerns will enhance guest health and safety, maintain brand image, help achieve health requirements and reduce lost revenue.
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Chandan Singh, COO, Dhofar Global Trading, says, “There’s an elevated risk of contracting cold and flu viruses if someone nearby sneezes or coughs or if an infected person at the gym wipes his mouth or nose, touches the treadmill or bench press and doesn’t wipe it down again.” Viruses aren’t the only concern. A more dangerous, though much less common, threat is a bacterium called methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, which causes an aggressive skin infection that may cause boils, redness, swelling and discomfort, and doctors worry about it because it continues to mutate and doesn’t respond to certain antibiotics. Apart from this, diseases like hepatitis, which can be contracted from contact with sweat from another person; athlete’s foot (or a similar fungal infections), which can be contracted from shower areas; and in extreme cases, legionaire’s disease are some high-risk infections in gyms and fitness centres.Maintaining standards
Keeping a facility clean is undoubtedly a never-ending challenge. It is imperative to not be complacent with cleaning a nd maintenance routines. Carst Parchow, General Manager-UAE, Al Bariq Equipment, informs, “Cleaning in fitness centres is somehow similar to cleaning in healthcare, although there are less critical points as these environments are not attended by users affected by various types of pathologies.
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However, there are important rules to be followed.” Many gyms make available antiseptic spray bottles and paper towels. It’s very important that high traffic areas are constantly cleaned during opening hours, “But warm wet locker rooms, which are hot beds for microbes, must also be given due attention,” he cautions. Showers, in particular are notorious for carrying lots of germs like fungi and much attention must also be paid to r elaxation area with saunas and steam rooms. Al Bariq uses the TTS range of products, which conducts professional cleaning at 360°, and can grant specific solutions for disinfection and cleaning of different areas according to different bacterial diffusion.
The Aviation Club at Jumeirah Creekside Hotel ensures that cleanliness is maintained on a r egular basis. Darrell McEwan, Spa and Sports & Leisure Manager, says, “Cleaning chemicals and paper towels are properly placed in an area that can easily be located when needed for wiping equipment after use. And, we conduct daily inspection of all ar eas to identify and prevent potential hazards that may occur. We scrub the floors with all-purpose chemicals, and ensure that the schedule is strictly followed at all times.” Gold’s Gym UAE – one of the leading standalone fitness centres in the country – has strict rules in place for both users and the cleaning staff.
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Samuel Naidu, Health and Safety Operations Manager, informs, “We advise each member to use a sweat towel during their workout – we also provide them with towels. In addition, disinfectant wipes are readily available throughout the club, and members are asked to wipe down equipment after use. Signage is also displayed to encourage this.” Shower areas are cleaned daily with pressure washers, and several times a day with disinfectant solutions to kill bacteria, while they use water machines with top-of-the-range filtration systems designed to eradicate all bacteria fr om water, including legionella.
The key to maintaining hygiene standards is to minimise the opportunity for micro-organisms to spread and reproduce. Tom Marshall, Sales Manager-Middle East, SCA Hygiene Products, suggests, “One of the simplest ways to ensure this is for the fitness centre to promote an efficient hand hygiene protocol.” SCA supplies a number of products and programmes to support this. Marshall recommends bactericidal hand soap like Tork Antimicrobial Foam Soap coupled with high-quality paper towels, which have been proven to be the most hygienic way of drying hands and are also excellent for wiping surfaces clean as they physically remove bacteria and are disposable. Outside of the washroom, Marshall also recommends that an EN1500 hand sanitiser be made available for the gym users. This ensures that harmful germs are killed rather than spread around and multiplied.
Finally, Dhofar Global’s Gym Wipes are specially formulated to remove sweat and grime conveniently without harming workout surfaces. The product contains no alcohol, no ammonia and leaves no residue, while both disinfecting and cleaning surfaces and equipment in gyms quickly, effectively and safely from various bacterial and strains.
Warm areas
Apart from the main gymming area, the warm, wet locker rooms are hot beds for microbes. Showers, in particular, are notorious for carrying lots of germs that can cause athlete’s foot. Moreover, while the sauna has always been regarded as a clean space, due to the warm and damp conditions, it may also contain some hygiene risks. If built using the correct materials, with sufficient ventilation and correct temperature, it is easy to keep the sauna hygienic. Singh says, “In 2002, a study into sauna hygiene, the comfort and effects of humidity, stated that no dangerous microbes or diseases were discovered. In terms of microbiological risks, saunas were declared not to pose any real risk to health since the microbes found are normally present in humans anyway.”
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Naidu concurs, “The temperature of the sauna ranges between 70-80 degrees, which is far too high for any bacteria to grow. The only bacteria that can survive the heat of a sauna, is hepatitis, which can be contracted from contact with the sweat of another person. This shatters the misconception that the sauna requires ‘special cleaning’ compared to the rest of the facility, as hepatitis can be contracted just as easily from sitting on a bench/machine. Similar to our prevention measures used on the gym floor, members are required to use a barrier between their skin and the sauna bench – a towel. Again, this being the UAE, members are not permitted to enter the sauna in the nude, and towels are therefore a requirement by management. Needless to say, the sauna is cleaned daily using disinfectant (but nonflammable) chemicals to ensure good levels of hygiene.”
Nevertheless, Parchow cautions, “Besides regular cleaning of the filters, the surface of the sauna/steam room must be cleaned and disinfected every day according to the manufacturer’s instructions and the cleaning products recommended by the manufacturer. This is a physical process, which removes soil, dust, dirt and organic matter along with a large proportion of germs. Cleaning with hot water and detergent breaks up grease and dirt on floors and surfaces; accurate washing and then disinfection with soaked microfiber mop heads must be carried out.” Both The Aviation Club and Gold’s Gym outsource their cleaning services. Naidu explains, “We recognise that our facilities require specialist cleaning, hence the use of a contractor who specialises in cleaning. Each club has a cleaning schedule designed specifically for the needs of that particular club. We take into account the size of the club, the size of its member base, daily usage, etc. Based on these facts, we allocate a different number of cleaning staff to each club so that consistent cleaning standards are maintained across the business. The schedule itself is too vast to delve into, but suffice to say that it covers all areas of the club, and at a frequency relevant to its daily usage.”
With the gym culture firmly settling into the social psyche of the average individual in the UAE, it is heartening to see both gyms and cleaning and hygiene companies’ emphasis on strict hygiene practices in these spaces.
