Using Disposable Gloves Properly

In food service, gloves are not usually worn to keep your hands clean. They are primarily meant to protect ready-to-eat foods from contamination from your hands. Only when bussing tables, washing dirty dishes, or performing cleaning tasks are gloves meant to protect the user. Always ask yourself who your gloves are protecting.

Dirty gloves can be worse than no gloves at all! With bare hands, we notice more readily when our hands get food residue or other contamination on them. This can help us remember to wash our hands more often, but many diseases of public health concern can be transferred from bare hands to ready-to-eat food. It is safest jus to get in the habit of changing your gloves frequently, and remember to always wash your hands before putting on clean gloves.

Q: Why do we require food workers to wear disposable gloves?

A: Our hands are the most common vehicle of contamination in a kitchen. We routinely touch multiple surfaces and food products. We use the restroom. We take out the trash. We handle dirty dishes. We handle raw meat and poultry during preparation. We clean food prep surfaces.

By washing our hands frequently and then putting on disposable gloves, we minimize the chances that ready-to-eat foods will be cross-contaminated. Gloves are a “second line of defense” (after handwashing) against the transmission of foodborne illnesses caused by Salmonella, E. coli, Shigella, Hepatitis A virus, and Norovirus.

Q: When must food workers wear disposable gloves?

A: Whenever they are handling ready-to-eat foods (except when they are washing vegetables and fresh fruits).

Q: What must food workers do before putting on disposable gloves?

A: Wash their hands thoroughly for at least 20 seconds using soap and warm water.

Q: When should a food worker change gloves?

A: A food worker should change their gloves:

• After handling soiled equipment or utensils (such as dirty dishes or silverware)

• Whenever their gloves become soiled or contaminated

• When their gloves get torn or punctured

• When switching between working with raw food and ready-to-eat food (in order to prevent cross-contamination)

• After coughing, sneezing, using a handkerchief or disposable tissue, using tobacco products, eating, or drinking

• After touching bare human body parts other than clean hands and the clean, exposed portions of their arms

• After using the restroom

• After caring for or handling animals

Q: What are some examples you have seen of improper glove use?

A: Here are some examples of improper glove use observed by local health department sanitarians:

• A food worker stopping work making salads, taking off their gloves to run the cash register, and then putting the same gloves back on to resume making salads (Remember, disposable gloves are single-use utensils)

• A food worker observed leaving the restroom wearing gloves and going back to work preparing tacos without first removing their soiled gloves, washing their hands, and donning clean disposable gloves

• A food worker blowing their nose and then not washing their hands and putting on a clean pair of disposable gloves

• A food worker wearing gloves while breading pieces of raw chicken and putting them in the fryer and then, while wearing the same gloves, turning around to the sandwich board, and making sandwiches (Changing tasks from working with raw foods to working with ready-to-eat foods is a source of cross-contamination)

• A dishwasher wearing gloves loading dirty dishes and tableware into the dishwasher and then, after the dishwasher has run, removing the clean dishes and silverware from the dishwasher while wearing the same gloves

• A food worker wearing disposable gloves taking trash out to the dumpster and then resuming work cutting up melons without washing their hands and putting on clean gloves (gloves were contaminated opening and closing the dumpster)

• A food worker washing their soiled gloves rather than removing them, washing their hands, and then putting on a clean pair of disposable gloves

• A food worker assembling hamburgers while wearing gloves with holes torn in them

• A food worker getting clean gloves out using dirty gloves (always wash your hands to prevent contamination of your clean gloves!)

• A food worker wearing disposable gloves while eating French fries from the fry warming bin

• A food worker carrying food out to someone's car wearing gloves and then resuming food prep work (door handles getting into and out of a restaurant are a source of contamination)

• A food worker wearing gloves to get food out of a refrigerator that is smeared with greasy handprints and food debris and then making a salad, sandwich or other ready-to-eat food for a customer (refrigerator handles are a source of contamination in busy restaurants, especially when raw and ready-to-eat products are being prepared in the same kitchen)

Tip: Instead of putting your box of disposable gloves on your prep line, put them in a dispenser mounted on the wall next to your hand sink. This way food workers will be reminded to always wash their hands before putting on clean disposable gloves.