Common Things You Shouldn’t Flush Down The Toilet

Many people perceived the toilet as a magical portal to an entirely different realm. The problem is that there are still some people who have no clue where things go once they are flushed down the toilet. The modern piping system sure makes the toilet a great convenience, but we must not forget that we owe it to ourselves and the community to keep it that way.

Anything flushed down the toilet goes through a sewer pipe, and each house has a sewer pipe that leads to a larger collective pipe, which many homes share. The wastes in the sewage pipe flow downhill until they reach a sewage treatment plant, which removes a lot of harmful materials and flushed items. It’s important to understand the distinction between things that can be flushed, things you can but shouldn’t flush, and things you can’t flush.

Contact Lenses

Millions of people use daily contact lenses, which can create a problem if they are not discarded properly. Disposing of it in the toilet can mean hundreds of millions of lenses flowing down the sewer, which can result in a frightening number of microplastics that can wreak havoc on marine life and sewage treatment plants.

Bleach

A lot of people like to use bleach to disinfect and clean their toilets because it can be effortless, but the problem is that the harshness of this chemical can wear down the piping coating and reduce its strength over time, which can complicate matters in the long run. The experienced plumbing specialists from https://allserviceplumbers.com/ have seen the bleach damage the piping far too often. Bleach is a truly effective cleaning chemical, but the problem is that it’s too strong to be used on many common-day items. You may end up needing an emergency drain repair when the pipes become damaged. 

Dental Floss Wires

While a very thin wire may not look harmful to anyone, but the material that dental floss is made of is quite powerful, either Teflon or nylon. These types of material do not disintegrate in water; Teflon particles specifically can last for millions of years, that’s how hard it is for it to disintegrate. Floss can easily tangle with other debris in the sewerage, creating a big ball of waste that can easily clog sewers and pumps.

Cosmetic Wipes

Wet wipes are known to be one of the very problematic items in any sewage treatment plant. These things are responsible for about 50% of the blockages that occur in sewer pipes through the accumulation of fats. Unlike normal toilet paper, these wipes are not weakened or easily decomposed in water, making them a major headache for any sewage treatment plant.

Baby Wipes

While baby wipes may look like soft and weak material, they’re quite resilient when it comes to resistance to decomposition or disintegration. Even if these wipes are quite gentle and soft on babies, it doesn’t mean that it can’t harm the environment. Some baby wipes are branded as ‘flushable,’ but they will only clog and damage your sewers because they don’t disintegrate quickly enough.

Condoms

Aside from being quite disgusting because they are quite obvious when they appear in a public sewerage system, they’re actually quite harmful to your pipes and the environment. Since most condoms are made out of latex, they are non-biodegradable in water, which means they can spend months, if not years, looking completely unaffected in water. Always make sure to dump any condoms in the trash.

Pads and Tampons

The process of disposing of pads and tampons can be a bit of a hassle to some women, depending on the circumstances, but using the toilet as trash for them can actually cause serious problems to the sewerage. They don’t disintegrate easily at all because they are already designed to resist fluids, so they can easily block or clog pipes. It’s always better to use a sanitary bag that you can dispose of easily in the trash if you put any used pads or tampons in it.

Baby Diapers

This may sound intuitive, but flushing diapers down the toilet is not something you want to do at all. Nevertheless, a lot of people do it, causing their drains to get clogged in a frighteningly short time. A lot of new diapers are made out of certain materials that can expand upon contact with water, adding fuel to the fire when you consider how big diapers already are.

While the joy of watching things down the drain may be fun for children, you’ll want to avoid the hassle that comes with it if you’re an adult. The environment is also affected dramatically by certain things that you shouldn’t flush down the toilet. It’s both beneficial for you and the environment to flush only proper waste in the toilet.