6 Things You Should Never Flush Down the Toilet
Things You Should Never Flush Down the Toilet
We get it. It’s tempting to flush things down the toilet instead of putting them in a bin or disposing of them some other way. After all, you put things in the toilet, flush it and whatever it was you put down there magically disappears.
Except, it doesn’t disappear.
Anything you flush down the toilet other than toilet paper and human waste. Can not only leave you with an expensive call out to a plumber or drainage company. But it can also contaminate the water system and cause environmental damage.
With that in mind, let’s have a look at 8 things you should never flush down the toilet.
Kitchen roll
Thanks to panic buyers buying all the toilet roll at the start of the pandemic, thousands of homes over the country had plumbing problems when people were forced to use kitchen roll instead of toilet roll, as this report from the BBC confirms.
You may think kitchen roll is just paper, so why can’t it be used in place of toilet roll? But there’s a reason why we use kitchen roll in the kitchen and toilet roll in the bathroom. The kitchen roll is thick and absorbent and great for mopping up spillages but it’s too thick to use instead of toilet roll and it doesn’t break down as easily.
If you’ve ever run out of kitchen roll and tried to mop up spillages with toilet roll, you’ll know how toilet roll just falls apart when it gets wet and is pretty useless at being kitchen roll. This is why kitchen rolls should stay in the kitchen and toilet roll should stay in the bathroom.
Baby wipes
Even baby wipes that say ‘flushable’ on the packet shouldn’t be flushed. Ignore the packaging and put baby wipes in the bin, as they don’t disintegrate the way toilet paper does and can stay in the system and cause blockages.
Menstrual products
We get it, putting tampons and sanitary towels in the bin is yuk and it seems much more hygienic to flush them away. But menstrual products are designed to absorb water and expand, so guess what they do when you flush them? That’s right – they absorb and expand, even more, blocking your plumbing system.
Dental floss
Flushing dental floss down the toilet is a really bad idea. Why? Dental floss isn’t biodegradable and, not only will it not break down, it can act as a net and wrap itself around anything else in the pipes, trapping it and causing a blockage.
So, after you’ve cleaned your teeth and flossed, drop that floss in the bin, not the toilet.
Cotton pads, balls and earbuds
All those cotton pads, balls and earbuds that get used a lot in bathrooms should never be flushed down the toilet. They don’t break down, they just get full of water and clump together to form a big blockage.
Grease and oil
Plumbers love Christmas Day. It’s not just because they get to enjoy a nice roast dinner but because they get to charge a hefty call-out fee to fix blocked drains after customers have poured all the grease and oil from their Christmas dinners down the sink or toilet and then wonder why they have problems with their plumbing.
But grease and oil are liquid, I hear you say. It’ll just flush away nicely.
Well, that’s where you’re wrong. Grease and oil may start out as a liquid but it soon cools, solidifies and sets in the pipes causing a blockage. If you don’t believe me, check out this report on a ‘fatberg’ in Birmingham.
How to not flush things down the toilet
It should be relatively easy to not flush things down the toilet. After all, all you have to do is not flush things down the toilet. We appreciate you don’t want to put everything in the bin though. Some things are just a bit, well, yuk.
In that case, get a bin with a secure lid so you and your guests can simply wrap up anything that needs to be disposed of and hidden discreetly in the bin to go out with the rest of the household rubbish.
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