Can you guess what's 11,000 times dirtier than a toilet seat?

Humans are dirty creatures - our water bottles, hangbags and, unsurprisingly, toilet seats are covered in germs and bacteria.

However new research has found that something humans touch approximately twice a week is so ridden with germs it is 11,000 times more utterly disgusting than your toilet seat. So what is it?

The petrol pump...

Picture: istock/ gremlin

Busbud.com swabbed three petrol station pumps and found that, on average, there were 2,011,970 colony-forming-units (CFU), also known as visible bacteria, per square inch. Toilets tend to have 172 CFU per square inch, while handbags on average have 9.7 and money 5.2.

The germs found on the pumps could cause skin infections, toxic shock syndrome, pneumonia and food poisoning.

I don't know about you but we're off to disinfect our car and invest in a vat of hand sanistiser. EUGH.