News

McDonald's kiosk touchscreens found with fecal bacteria

November 29, 2018

Stories are spreading like viruses across the news media concerning the findings of a kind of real-world experiment on McDonald's kiosk screens in a handful of London McDonald's stores recently conducted by British newspaper, The Metro, with the help of microbiologists. The scientists analyzed samples taken from swipes of kiosk touchscreens at eight McDonald's locations around London and Birmingham. 

In perhaps what is no surprise to anyone aware of the bacterial soup we all swim around in daily, every kiosk touchscreen was found to be teaming with an assortment of fecal matter organisms, according to a report in Inc. this week. 

Long story short of all this is that the test results indicated: 

• The restaurants' kiosk screens were crawling with microscopic bugs that can make kiosk users sick if ingested. 
• Those unseen microorganisms mostly came from human gastrointestinal tracts.  
• The bugs probably were passed to kiosk screens by customers who had fecal material on their hands. 
• The material stayed on the screen because the kiosk interfaces were not cleaned frequently or adequately enough to destroy the microorganisms between customers. 

Inc. magazine quoted one of the test's conductors, London Metropolitan University Senior Microbiology Lecturer Paul Matawele, as saying he and his fellow scientists were "all surprised (by) how much gut and fecal bacteria there was on the touchscreen machines."

Gastrointestinal flora like enterococcus faecalis was found, along with microscopic bugs like staphylococcus, listeria, klebsiella and proteus bacteria, any of which can easily make a person sick. 

Kiosk screen samples used in the test were taken at eight McDonald's outlets in London and Birmingham. Every touchscreen sampled had bacteria on it., according to Inc.

QSRweb, a Kiosk Marketplace sister publication, reached McDonald's corporate communications office this morning concerning the findings. A spokesperson for the brand said, "McDonald's assures its customers that regular daily cleaning of our self-order kiosks is policy in all U.S. locations. Our kiosks are cleaned using disinfectant cleaner with a microfiber cloth." 

The spokesperson did not provide further details nor did she detail what procedures are in place in the U.K. and other international locations of the chain.