Even people who don't sell paper towels for a living now suggest that after you wash your hands in a public restroom you should use a towel to turn off the water, since the handles are full of germs. If there's no towel, use your elbow. If the paper towel dispenser is manually operated, use our elbow there too. And use a paper towel on the doorknob. If there's no wastebasket near the door, "use your best shot" as you throw the towel toward wherever the basket is, Kingsley suggests.

It's enough to make a person look like he has obsessive-compulsive disorder, but that's better than being sick, Lukacsko says.

Face masks only help when there are droplets in the air, Kingsley says, and airborne flu germs are "so rare the probability is statistically small," unless of course you're in the path of a sneezer or cougher. Surfaces, on the other hand, can harbor germs for hours.

Hand sanitizers are helpful but not as good as washing with water, he says, because it's harder to wash correctly with the gels. In a study of women with artificial nails, researchers found that neither soap nor hand sanitizers were effective but a fingernail brush was.

And don't touch your face, Kingsley warns, after you've touched money, public doorknobs, shopping carts and other communal surfaces. "Ninety percent of the transfer (of flu germs) is in the T-zone: the eyes, the nose and mouth," he says. On average, people touch their faces every 15 minutes, he says.

E-mail: jarvik@desnews.com