If you start your daily shower with a blasting of water to your face it could making you sick. A study by the University of Colorado, USA concluded that shower heads are infected with pathogenic bacteria that has been linked to lung disease. The bacteria found, Mycobacterium avium (M avium) can cause serious health risks for people with weakened immune systems but can also infect the healthy.
Professor Norman Pace, who led the study said "If your getting a face full of water when you first turn your shower on, that means you are probably getting a particularly high load of M avium, which may not be too healthy."
Water that sprays from the shower heads can spread the bacteria filled droplets in the air and they are inhaled into the lungs. Symptoms from M avium include fatigue, persistent dry cough, shortness of breath, weakness and feeling unwell.
Researchers found that the incidence of lung disease caused by M avium may have risen over the last twenty years, as people now shower rather than take baths.
