EHO Knows: Pierce the Veil w/ Lisa Hughes

[00:00:00] Shane: Hello. Despite a public uproar on having Lisa on this show, a couple episodes, again, we are welcoming back Lisa Hughes to see if she can make us even more sick than she did the first time around. Uh, we won’t comment on the fact that she’s wearing the same shirt and I’m wearing the same shirt as our first episode.

[00:00:18] Shane: Welcome back, Lisa.

[00:00:20] Lisa: very much Shane. I will try my very best.

[00:00:24] Shane: Okay, so, uh, we got to the end of the last episode and then we’re talking about, you know, the horror stories or whatever. And so what we’ve got are three stories lined up on skin penetration today. and. Just a little bit of a teaser. Starting here, going here, ending there. Um, and so this is probably a bucket episode in terms of have a bucket ready?

[00:00:45] Shane: Um, you won’t need it for the first one. No promises for the other one. So we’ve set the expectation, Lisa. Um, story number one. Let’s start with a tat.

[00:00:55] Lisa: Alright, so, um, I was working for a local government organization and, we had a gentleman call us. He’d just gotten a tattoo a couple of days ago and he’d gotten an infection and we are talking, there was pass, there was seepage, there was odors. It was delightful. Um, and

[00:01:19] Shane: Okay. So when we say odors, you experience the odors, like

[00:01:23] Lisa: um,

[00:01:24] Shane: is this hands on experience?

[00:01:25] Lisa: don’t do odors very well, Shane, at all. Um, I’ve got this, I call it the permanent pregnancy smell, so I don’t do odors. Um, but he explained to me in detail the odors that he was experiencing and so he couldn’t even stand the smell of himself at that point. So he was really

[00:01:44] Shane: That’s gonna be really funny. Later on when you hear the, um, the punchline, he can’t stand the smell of himself. Just remember that one. Okay, so, so he can’t stand the smell. So we’re talking about an arm, we’re talking about past, we’re talking about blisters, we’re talking about just blah, and it was all from the tax.

[00:02:01] Lisa: that’s it. So he’d had a full arm tattoo right up, right down. both sides. He’d, he’d had done so he had been to the doctor and the doctor’s like, oh, you know, yeah, must, must be from where you got your tattoo. Didn’t ask too many questions. Gave him some antibiotics and ointments and potions and drugs and all that kind of stuff.

[00:02:19] Lisa: And told him to go and take it and contact counsel for counsel to do an inspection. So I had this gentleman on the phone, he told me where he had gotten the tattoo from and uh, I said, no worries mate. I will go and have a look and I will contact you at the end. I went and did

[00:02:38] Shane: Okay, so

[00:02:39] Lisa: Yep.

[00:02:40] Shane: you get that sort of infection. What are you expecting?

[00:02:43] Lisa: I’m expecting that the premises was filthy, that there was very little control, knowledge and practice in, in the place. I have done some inspections of some very dodgy tattoos. My first tattoo I was a lot younger than I am now, uh, was in probably one of the dodgiest places I’ve ever been in, in my entire life.

[00:03:08] Lisa: Um, and this was well before I was an EHO, so I thought that we were going into the dark and dingy, you know, you think sort of breaking bads type stuff, bies and cigarettes and all that kind of stuff. I thought, ah, this is, this is gonna be fun.

[00:03:22] Shane: Okay, so where was the tattoo located? The, the parlor? Are we talking about home? Are we talking about shopping center?

[00:03:30] Lisa: It was, in a row of shops on a main street, very busy main road in Sydney.

[00:03:39] Shane: so your typical tattoo parlor now.

[00:03:42] Lisa: that’s exactly right. You know, particularly, almost 20 years ago. So this was pretty early on in my career. So as you can, you know, all the eh hos that are listening probably went well. Why didn’t you ask a bunch of questions? no I didn’t. I just went, yep. He must be telling the truth and it must be coming from this place. So in, I went all guns blazing.

[00:04:01] Shane: That’s a little bit of a spoiler there. So anyway, okay, so you walk into this filthy cess pit of a tattoo parlor and you discover,

[00:04:10] Lisa: It just smelt of disinfectant. It was beautiful. I walked in, it was light, it was airy. Everyone was lovely. You could eat off the floor. It was absolutely immaculate.

[00:04:23] Shane: okay, but the guy licked it between each one like so.

[00:04:28] Lisa: So I went through the inspection he was probably one of the first in Sydney, um, to be using single use disposable, aper apparatus. So it, back in the day you had a tattoo machine that had a cord. Um, you know, it’s very weighty and a lot of the old school guys really liked it. Now they, they sort of look more like a pen. So you don’t have the cords that can go over the, the open areas or anything like that. back in those days, you could needles. The legislation has changed since then. Um, so you could reuse needles as long as they went through. Um, a, a whole process before they got to the auto club and then they needed to be autoclaved. Um, but now they must be single use, thank goodness. Um, but he was using single use, um, everything, including needles. Back in those days,

[00:05:26] Shane: Okay, so no smoking gun

[00:05:28] Lisa: no smoking gun. I came outta there going, yep, I’d actually get a tattoo from you. Um, and I’d

[00:05:34] Shane: and in fact you got 15 done while you were there,

[00:05:37] Lisa: well that’s it.

[00:05:37] Shane: but. Okay, so no smoking gun. You walk out What’s next?

[00:05:42] Lisa: Walk out going right, you know, like the guy had sent me photos and I, I, I admitted that at the beginning. He’d sent me photos and they were pretty gnarly. Um, and I’m like, well, so he is not lying. He has got an infection, what’s going on? So I get back to the office and I give him a call and I’m like, mate, I’ve been out. she’s pretty good. Like, you know, there was a few minor things, but in the hole, I can’t see. You know, where you got this infection and, you know, he was pretty cranky. and I just said, all right, look, let’s, let’s take a step back. When you got the tattoo done, did they put give you aftercare? Yes. They gave me aftercare. Right. Did they put any barrier on, you know, it’s usually clinging wrap, particularly in those days you’ve got, you know, second skin and things like that these days. But back in those days it was glad wrap.

[00:06:30] Shane: Good. Plug there for Glad Wrap.

[00:06:31] Lisa: yep. So I was wrap. Um, so yeah, so it was, he goes, yeah, I wrapped it up. Um, and I kept it on for a couple of hours and I took it off.

[00:06:40] Lisa: Said, okay. Said cool. Said, what do you do for a living? And he goes, I’m a plumber. I said, all right. Did you take some time off work while it was healing? And he is like, no, I couldn’t afford to do that. Needed to go back to work, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, okay. Alright. What did you do to protect yourself whilst you are doing plumbing? He’s like. Nothing, you know, I just, I had a shirt on. I said, okay, did you have a shirt on all the time? well, no love, it’s summer. It’s really, really hot on side. And I said, okay. I said, well, look, tell me some of the, the, you know, were you doing like industrial plumbing? And he goes, no, I was out doing houses.

[00:07:19] Lisa: I said, okay, no worries. Um, I said, look, tell me a couple of the places that you went. oh, probably the worst one I went to was to get underneath the house because they had a leaking sewer pipe under there. So I was in with all of their, you know, excrement, um, water, um, was mixed in with the ground. And I said, okay. Did you have a shirt on? No, it was hot. Okay. Did you put any protection on your arm?

[00:07:48] Shane: When you say, no, it was hot. I suspect he didn’t say no, it was hot. I couldn’t imagine it coming across slightly more ly and more forcefully.

[00:07:59] Lisa: Absolutely. ’cause he thought I was silly. Um, he was, you know, very adamant that he had done nothing wrong and that it was, I had, um, not inspected properly and it was old mate at the tattoo parlor had given him an infection. So I had to

[00:08:16] Shane: Yes.

[00:08:16] Lisa: break it to him, in no uncertain terms that he’s probably given himself the infection. Um, and I’d be going and getting some blood work done because you don’t know if the people in that house have any types of hepatitis or anything like that. And you’ve got a massive open wound on your arm and you’ve been rolling around in other people’s poo.

[00:08:37] Shane: no, there’s so many things I find funny about that story. One is your opening comment. He couldn’t stand the smell of himself yet. He’s happy to roll around in people’s excrement, and he doesn’t think twice about that.

[00:08:47] Lisa: Yep.

[00:08:48] Shane: Two, he rocks up to a doctor with all of this and the doctor doesn’t say, Hey, do it.

[00:08:54] Shane: I noticed you are a plumber. Have you been, you know, whatever. And then he turns around and goes, wait a minute. The sterile, tattoo parlor gave me this infection. Let’s just forget about the, crap that I’ve been rolling around in my job. and so you’re there then telling him, actually the, bittersweet bit at the end is going, actually, it’s probably the, crap that you’ve been rolling in.

[00:09:17] Shane: And I would now go back to the doctor and say, Hey, can you gimme a whole stack of blood tests? Because apparently rolling in shit isn’t the best thing for my health. and it’s just like,

[00:09:26] Lisa: It

[00:09:27] Lisa: boggles.

[00:09:28] Shane: yeah. Okay. So that’s our starting point.

[00:09:31] Shane: so skin penetration, and we’re throwing that one in because quite often, uh, you automatically just think that the, tattoo person is the, um, the evil one. And when you start talking about, safety, public safety around tattoos, you automatically go, oh, it’s this. Whereas in fact, the after skincare is just as important, possibly more important than, um, what happened there.

[00:09:55] Shane: So, lesson number one, after getting a tattoo, don’t roll his shit. Okay. Um, story number two. Now, uh, this one I came across the concept years ago when I lived in Malaysia. Um, and, and Tym. So more than aware of, of the concepts, but to actually then find out that it’s now gone from a religious ceremony to something that happens in a bar was, um, was truly bizarre. Okay, so where we’re about to head into is suspension.

[00:10:30] Shane: What the hell is suspension?

[00:10:33] Lisa: The easiest way I can visualize it for people is that suspension is just getting a bunch of fish hooks and sticking it underneath your skin, like your quarter fish. Um, and then raising you up on some sort of platform so that you then hang suspended by these ropes and these fish hooks that are in your skin. So you can

[00:10:57] Shane: And by fish hooks, we don’t mean little fish hooks, we mean big fish hooks.

[00:11:00] Lisa: like meat hooks really, um, if you, if you’ve ever been in a butcher and have seen meat hooks, that’s what it looks like.

[00:11:08] Shane: And, um, and we’ll possibly put some photos in the videos. My video editor’s gonna hate this. Uh, uh, but you literally got your skin being pulled inches away from your body with these big hooks in it. Um, and okay, so in the first place, uh, so where, so where did this story occur?

[00:11:31] Lisa: Uh, so this. occurred in Sydney, uh,

[00:11:34] Shane: Yep.

[00:11:35] Lisa: ago. Um, because all of my really gory stories happened quite some time ago. And there was a real underground grungy alternative nightclub that didn’t last too long, uh, but was incredibly popular.

[00:11:51] Shane: Okay, so this is a public nightclub which had suspension as an activity. Okay. From an environmental health officer point of view. Do you have a registered list of, of suspension places? Like was it even on the public radar?

[00:12:11] Lisa: No,

[00:12:12] Shane: Um,

[00:12:13] Lisa: no.

[00:12:14] Shane: okay.

[00:12:14] Lisa: We have a register of skin penetration premises. Okay. We have to have one of those under the legislation here in New South Wales. And that suspension falls into that. However, they had done none of their, don’t know, pre-business checks to actually determine what notifications they may have needed to do to council to be able to run these types of events.

[00:12:44] Shane: I’d love to know if there’s someone out there who has actually done a, um, you know, wandered in. So you were talking about inspecting, brothels, wandering into one of these places at night just to make sure, hey, has that, uh, has that hook been sterilized? Uh, is that a fresh hook? Are you reusing a hook, whatever.

[00:13:03] Shane: Um, yes. Okay. So, so this one underground, and so how did it come across your, um, your table?

[00:13:15] Lisa: that’s a good question. You’re going back into my filing system in my mind. Uh, I’m pretty sure it was the police got in contact with us, so people had complained to the police about the venue for a number of different things, and the police were like, this is so outside what we know. contact council.

[00:13:33] Lisa: And of course, you know where all of the wind and wonderful things sort of trickle down to is environmental health. We eventually were notified of it.

[00:13:43] Shane: Yeah. Okay. So because there’s no immediate dead bodies and people are doing it voluntarily, then it’s not a crime. So the police dunno what to do with it, and they’re just looking at it going, this is weird and wacky. We’ll make it your problem.

[00:13:56] Lisa: Yeah, pretty much.

[00:13:57] Shane: Yeah.

[00:13:58] Lisa: Pretty much. Uh, so it was, it was an interesting one to get and, you know, we needed to determine, you know, what was going on. So we, as we did, we, we went and did a late night check, and was absolutely horrified from an environmental health perspective as to what I was seeing.

[00:14:23] Shane: Um, and so how many people, what were you seeing? What was going on?

[00:14:28] Lisa: the, the nightclub was full, it was super popular, um, with the, the alternate set in Sydney and. was a real place for, for people with, um, like-mindedness to come together. So it was a really popular venue, uh, run by a very, um, eccentric person.

[00:14:49] Shane: Are we talking do, are we talking screamo?

[00:14:53] Lisa: Yeah.

[00:14:53] Shane: Are we talking about classical music in the background?

[00:14:56] Lisa: it was, it was um, uh, like Depeche mode. It was, it was dark. It was, you know, it was, the music was throbbing. It was, yeah, it was, it was a really, um, you could feel the base in your, in your body,

[00:15:12] Shane: Yes.

[00:15:12] Lisa: at the time.

[00:15:14] Shane: And just a bunch of people hanging around, so to speak.

[00:15:18] Lisa: yeah, hanging around, having a great time. Like they were loving life, um, having beers, you know, it was, it, it was a, it was a great vibe. It was a fantastic vibe if you were there. Not with my hat on.

[00:15:31] Shane: Yes. Okay. And now we get to the people who are literally hanging around.

[00:15:36] Lisa: Hanging from the roof. So I was watching these people hanging from the roof, and I’m like, yeah, okay. And then like, I’m like, well, hold on. You’ve got basically meat hooks in you, uh, what’s going on here? And then you could see the blood, the, you know, obviously they’ve got massive wounds and it’s not just one or two.

[00:15:53] Lisa: They’ve, you know, to be able to not rip your skin, they’ve gotta put lots and lots of these hooks in. So we had a lot of blood sort of trickling from these people. But to enhance the experience for the people that were being dangled, they started to spin them around. And as they started to spin them around, we had a centrifuge effect. So the blood started spraying over all of the people that were underneath them.

[00:16:24] Shane: Oh, so it’s dripping in the first place and then it gets to the stage where it’s just spraying.

[00:16:29] Lisa: Yep, that’s it.

[00:16:30] Shane: so

[00:16:31] Lisa: And people were underneath them.

[00:16:32] Shane: we’re talking, we’re talking Dexter on steroids. We’re talking blood splatter.

[00:16:38] Lisa: yep.

[00:16:39] Shane: Okay?

[00:16:39] Lisa: was literally, yeah, as I said, it was literally a centrifugal um, effect. People were spinning around, um, people were underneath with their open drinks. You know? It, it was

[00:16:53] Shane: And then the irony is that if you’ve got spirits, you’re fine. But if you’ve got your low alcohol beer, you are stuffed because you are just, you know, chugging on, on blood. Um. Okay, are we talking about a little bit of blood or you know, are you visibly noticing blood splatter on people’s faces on the floors table?

[00:17:15] Lisa: there was more than one person up there. I think from memory it was two or three. Um, ’cause the, it was a big warehouse. It was pretty big. Um. It was a significant amount of blood that people, you know, I mean it wasn’t, you know, horror movie stuff, but it was noticeable and you could see it being sprayed around.

[00:17:36] Lisa: So from a public health perspective, it was incredibly concerning.

[00:17:42] Shane: Wow. Okay, so how long did the place last then you go do your report. What happened after that?

[00:17:48] Lisa: was actually the police that closed it down. Um, we didn’t have great legislation back in those days to be able to deal with these types of things. Um, again, it’s changed, but it’s still not great. Um, but it was even less great back then. so the police actually closed it down from a liquor licensing perspective, and that’s how they shut it down. ’cause there was a

[00:18:09] Shane: Wow.

[00:18:09] Lisa: of other issues as well.

[00:18:11] Shane: Yeah, so, so the irony is you can spray blood, blood all over your, your patrons, that’s fine. But break the liquor license laws and that’s it. You are toast. So, media shut. Um, which probably is really interesting one, because when it comes to, to crimes in the past, um, yeah. You know, um, uh, it was Al Capone wasn’t it?

[00:18:35] Shane: That was done on tax evasion, um, not on organized crime. And so here you’ve got somewhere that’s just on a health basis, blah.

[00:18:42] Lisa: Yeah,

[00:18:43] Shane: And then it’s the liquor license that gets them shut down. So, um, yes, it’s, it’s always good to partner with other people. Um, so yes.

[00:18:54] Lisa: task force. And, and, um, you know, many moons ago I was involved with a number of multi-agency task force you know, included environmental health. It included the police, it included fire and rescue and, you know, if there was a fire breach. You could, you could literally shut down a place and everyone out now. So you know, it, it’s very powerful.

[00:19:17] Shane: So in this place you’ve got blood spraying all over the place and you go, wow, I can’t shut it down. But wait a minute. They’ve got three tables in front of their fire escapes. Woo. Okay. Everyone out. Um, yes. Ironic but always a good, um, uh, yeah. As up your sleeve. So

[00:19:36] Lisa: absolutely.

[00:19:36] Shane: yes. And while we talk about as up our sleeves, we’ll now to move to the third story.

[00:19:44] Shane: Um, and so this one is even more obscure. We’re talking about something that doesn’t happen in Australia

[00:19:52] Lisa: Too much. so.

[00:19:54] Shane: that you know about.

[00:19:56] Lisa: No, came across this story when I was researching for a PhD that I have not started and is still sitting on, on the shelf. Um, but doing my, um, literature review came across some absolute horror stories to do with nail bars

[00:20:12] Shane: Okay, so nail bars are where lonely nails go to meet other lonely nails. So,

[00:20:19] Lisa: halfway.

[00:20:19] Shane: uh, okay, so, um, yes, so nail bar horror story.

[00:20:26] Lisa: Yeah, so nail bars are increasingly popular, not just in Australia, but across the world. And this trend really did start, um, in the US and there’s been a little bit of research, more research happen over there than, um, here in Australia to do with the risks of infections in nail bars. Now nail bars only fall under the Public Health Act if they undertake a skin penetrating activity. Really in the general population of nail bars in New South Wales, that is only cuticle cut cutting. So, um, where they get a, um, particular, uh, that’s designed to cut cuticles, that is your skin penetration. So that’s when you would go in and inspect them under public health legislation

[00:21:16] Shane: Okay, so we’re talking about something that’s got zero risk. Okay. It’s, it’s perfectly safe. And so that’s why it’s at the tail end of this episode because there’s no risk and it’s, you know, surprise, surprise. Um, okay, so, so what’s, what’s the risk with nail bars then?

[00:21:32] Lisa: So nail bars, you have, um, a lot of skin to skin contact and so, you know, our hands are filthy. They are. We use our hands for absolutely everything. So we have a lot of cutting and filing and buffing and things like that when you go into a nail bar. So, I mean, I personally have, I get my nails done all the time before my current lady, who is fantastic.

[00:21:59] Lisa: Um, I have been to nail bars where they’ve been, um, just, uh, filing down the nail to be able to apply the acrylic to, and they’ve hit the nail bed. And so that’s not, you know, those, those nail um, files aren’t designed to hit the nail bed. They’re not designed to penetrate the skin, but they can, and, you know, you can have nicks and cuts around your fingers, um, just from nail files if they, uh, file too too hard, which will allow that pathway for infection.

[00:22:32] Shane: Okay, so in one sense it’s sort of like going to a barber and they’re using scissors, but you look at scissors and you go, they’re designed for cutting, so therefore you need to sterilize them. Whereas, uh, this is just filing your nail. It’s not coming in contact with your skin. It’s not cutting the skin.

[00:22:49] Shane: So therefore it’s zero risk. But the truth is, uh, in, in, in inexperienced hands or even experienced hands, I guess you run the risk that you will graze, you will cut, you will break the surface.

[00:23:04] Lisa: Yeah,

[00:23:04] Shane: Um.

[00:23:05] Lisa: And you’ve, so then you’ve got that pathway for infection. Now, because these particular items are not designed to penetrate the skin, you don’t need to put them, or a lot of the times you can’t put them through an autoclave, but you don’t need to put them through an autoclave. So if you think about, you know, getting your feet cut with this, um, some scissors and they just put some disinfectant over it and then they use those same, um, scissors to cut the next person’s, um, nails if there’s any fungal infection can be passed from client to client.

[00:23:40] Shane: Because as much as we were talking about hand contact, we’re actually talking about also feet And Yes. Okay.

[00:23:47] Lisa: absolutely.

[00:23:48] Shane: now we’re going into the, the, yeah. Grier, but yes, whatever’s on your hands, whatever’s on your feet. And they’ve now broken the, the skin of the previous person. Um, okay, so at this stage it still sounds minor little grazers.

[00:24:05] Lisa: Yep. Where do we go to from here? there’s been lots of studies in the United States, not so many here in Australia, um, where there’s been an outbreak of infection. Um, and those infections are usually, well, the ones that have been researched, um, A-M-R-S-A, so multi-drug resistant, um, sorry, MRSO, a multi-drug resistant organism.

[00:24:32] Lisa: So it, they’re really, really hard to treat. So you think sort of golden staph and along those lines, hard to diagnose, hard to treat, um, and can lead to you losing your finger in the extreme case.

[00:24:49] Shane: Okay, and it’s. Um, it’s all because you’re talking about, you’re making contact with a large number of people. Um, nowadays we are getting more and more drug resistant. So if you did just get a a, a minor graze and it’s infected, you go home, you put a bit of, of disinfectant on it, it’ll fix itself up. But the truth is that now because we’re getting more and more, um, drug resistant organisms, it’s getting to the stage where, well wait a minute.

[00:25:17] Shane: One of the primary places for this to potentially spread is at a nail bar

[00:25:23] Lisa: Yeah.

[00:25:23] Shane: as something as just getting your nails done. And if you’ve got an inexperienced person who’s there, just, uh, doing one person after the next, that’s your magical sequence. Uh.

[00:25:34] Lisa: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, in my parents’ days, you know, going and getting your nails done in a, in a shopping center was not a thing. Um, it just, you know, in the eighties and nineties just wasn’t, you know. There wasn’t nail bars around. If you got your nails done, you went to the beautician. Um, however, over the last 20 years, nail bars have become increasingly popular, uh, popular, and the treatments have become, um, less expensive, so they’re more affordable.

[00:26:02] Lisa: So it opens it up to a range of, um, a whole new demographic basically.

[00:26:09] Shane: So, no, just in my, yeah. Shopping center, they’re now big places. Like they employ a dozen people.

[00:26:16] Lisa: Hmm.

[00:26:16] Shane: and you just see, you know, uh, share after chair, um, yeah, getting feet done or, you know, whatever. And as a guy just wander past. Um, but yeah, it is now a really, really big business. Uh, you also. I guess by the look of the ages of the people there, you’re talking about something that’s relatively unskilled in terms of you can come in and start working quickly and do stuff, um, right up to, um, yeah.

[00:26:45] Shane: People who have been in the industry for, for many years, um, and experience. So, uh.

[00:26:51] Lisa: absolutely. And I mean the majority of them have got some sort of certificate three in, um, in nails, uh, through a registered training organization. However, the infection control training is not the forethought of that, of that training. It is actually how to do it. Is, is what they focus on rather than infection control.

[00:27:17] Shane: And my guess is that the big in, um, research in America has been because, you know, suddenly there’s been half a dozen random cases of golden staff and they’re trying to go, Hey, what was the common cause? And they can link it back. Um, whereas here, it’s likely to happen. Um, but unless someone’s actually trying to look for the common cause, um, it won’t be happening.

[00:27:43] Shane: Um, also we won’t be putting it together and we’re really not researching. Yeah. What’s the practices that are happening within, uh, nail bars? We’re not looking for common links. Um, infections or whatever. Um, so yes, uh, if anyone wants to do a PhD, here’s a topic on, um, on what are the risks, uh, what’s the practices in Australia, um, yeah.

[00:28:09] Lisa: absolutely. And in America it really started because they had a couple of major outbreaks in the two thousands, and that was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people. So yeah. Yeah. So many hundreds of of people, um, were, were getting these infections. So, uh, it was, and that’s how it, it happened.

[00:28:29] Lisa: Whereas in Australia, you might get one or two and they, know, like our population in Australia, we, you know, I mean, where I grew up, my nearest shopping center, and I, I lived in, in Greater Western Sydney. My shopping center was 50, 50 minutes away, so it was. People travel in to shopping centers. You know, I, I live in the Blue Mountains now.

[00:28:52] Lisa: My nearest shopping center is 40 minutes away, you know, so people are coming everywhere, but I’ve got two gps within five minutes, um, from me. So it may be that these infections are happening, but people are going to different gps and it, the link’s not happening.

[00:29:11] Shane: Yes. And it’s, it’s, you know, individual infections are minor and it’s not until you are amputating that a hospital would be going, Hey, wait a minute, why are we chopping off, um, so many fingers at the moment. Um, yeah, so, so really, really obscure. So from that point of view, it’s a little bit tough because how could you walk into a nail bar and say, Hey, this one’s a high risk, um, and this one’s a low risk, you know?

[00:29:40] Shane: Uh, yeah. Are there any identifiers? How could, yeah, what would you look for?

[00:29:45] Lisa: So if you were a potential client, you would be looking to make sure that they are auto clouding the reusable items, so you really want them to open the packet in front of you. The implements in that packet, you want the packet to be just one item per packet. That’s what is required for, for autoclaving. The items need to be, so for those who don’t know, this is an autoclaved bag, okay? Looks like this. A sterilization pouch. And the items, I’ll just use my pen. The items will go into the bag, and you want the items to be just one item in that bag. And you want them to be either broken down to their smallest part, or you want them to be in the open position, but before your items get into that bag, they need to be clean.

[00:30:41] Lisa: I have seen, uh, cuticle cutters that have been through the autoclave correctly. However, it’s, they’ve still got bits of skin touched, uh, attached to them, so not sterile.

[00:30:55] Shane: Yes. You cannot sterilize dirty,

[00:30:57] Lisa: No, you

[00:30:58] Shane: so,

[00:30:59] Lisa: Absolutely. So skills and knowledge, and it’s hard for a, like a client to really, um, be able to delve into skills and knowledge. Um, but skills and knowledge in reprocessing equipment is really, really important. And you are paying for that service. Ask them, do you know how to repro, you know, how do you know how to clean?

[00:31:19] Lisa: You know, all that kind of stuff. Have a look. Are they spraying the benches between clients? If not, then that for me is a bit of a red flag.

[00:31:28] Shane: So a lot of the principles of food safety in terms of, um, yeah. You know, cleaning down the benches or whatever, um, uh, I assume gloves on behalf of staff are now just mandatory. Um,

[00:31:42] Lisa: No,

[00:31:42] Shane: please, not at this stage.

[00:31:43] Lisa: no,

[00:31:43] Shane: Okay.

[00:31:44] Lisa: stage. Not it’s, um, not from an environmental health perspective. Maybe from a safe work perspective, but not from our perspective. Um, until they are. Undertaking a skin penetrating

[00:31:57] Shane: Wow. Okay. And so then, you know, the hope of changing gloves and washing hands or whatever, uh, are the things that you’d be hoping that they do.

[00:32:07] Lisa: Yeah,

[00:32:07] Shane: Um, but yeah, it is interesting that from an environmental health officer’s point of view, uh, it’s not until they cut that you can step in and say, Hey, what’s going on?

[00:32:17] Lisa: that’s it.

[00:32:18] Shane: Um, but.

[00:32:19] Lisa: legislation under the local government Act. Um, in the table of orders. There is, um, you know, for, for beauty salons, you know, clean, you know, a clean and hygienic manner, um, which are wonderfully loose terms. Um, can look them from that perspective, but still, we’re not into, we, there’s not enough research and, and knowledge out there at the moment as to what these premises that don’t fall under the Public Health Act are really. Doing and the infections. well, the number of infections out there and, and the consequences of those infections we’ve seen, um, you know, some of those, uh, programs that happen after the news where they’re running down the street chasing some poor operator because someone’s got an infection. But again, lesson I learned with the tattooist was ask the question, what did you do before you went, um, or sorry, after you went and got your treatment done, you know, did the question for an EHO.

[00:33:29] Lisa: If you get those, um, these coming into you is, okay, great, what did you do in the next few days? Did you garden? Did you wash up? Did you change your baby’s nappy? You know, all of those types of things, because just because they’ve got an infection doesn’t mean it necessarily mean that it, it came from that premises.

[00:33:47] Shane: Yes. Um, and this is where we pretend to be really, really clever, in that we deliberately, um, uh, topped and tailored the episode with the first one. We went for something that you would expect to be a risk, and it turned out to be, um, what the, uh, customer was doing afterwards. Um, and then in this one you’re talking about something that you don’t assume is a risk because, you know, it’s, it’s not doing skin penetration, it’s just filing your nails.

[00:34:15] Shane: Whereas in fact, um, it’s not until you look at a large population and start putting all the dots together that you realize, no, those little nicks were, um, uh, were high risk. Um, and so, so from a, um. I’m trying to work out the cause of things. Don’t jump to conclusions too quickly, uh, and follow the trail.

[00:34:39] Shane: Have a bit of fun. So, okay. So yes. Uh, the, the magical world of skin penetration, uh, the funny games of things that we do voluntarily and involuntarily. Uh, uh, hopefully, yeah, that middle one, a little bit of a horror story. Uh, it is a fascinating one in terms of, I saw it as a religious act. You saw it in a pub, and so it is there.

[00:35:09] Shane: Um, and then the, uh, yeah, having the nail bars absolutely everywhere. Uh, research hasn’t been done in Australia, but would be interesting to know what’s the risk. Largely not. Not bothered with. And then the good old tattoo parlor that we can all pick on. Um, there we go. Skin penetration at its, its most obscure, worst, uh, and hopefully best.

[00:35:37] Shane: So thank you, Lisa.

[00:35:39] Lisa: a problem.