French really are le great unwashed!

Four in ten admit not showering every day

WE MAY have suspected it for years, but now it seems we finally have the proof. The French really are the great unwashed.

A disconcerting four out of ten people in France do not shower every day, with 11 per cent washing only once every three days.

And 8 per cent of the French men and women polled confessed that they shower around once a week, according to a poll.

The survey found that fewer than twothirds of the country’s population shower daily and 24 per cent shower once every two days. When the average French person does take a shower they only spend an average of nine minutes getting clean.

The poll by hygiene company Initial France also found that hand-washing was ‘not always a priority for the French’. One eighth admitted to not washing their hands after going to the toilet. And those aged 18 to 34 were far less likely to clean the toilet than French pensioners.

The firm’s spokesman Virginia Mallet said: ‘In France, we have a hard time admitting that poor hygiene is a factor linked to illness. Washing one’s hands after going to the toilet is automatic in some countries, but in France we have always underestimated this simple act.’

A separate poll discovered that British citizens are cleaner than our continental counterparts in Germany, Spain and France. Britons were also found to be more conscientious about bathing than Russians, Americans and Australians.

But just in case we started feeling smug, last month it was revealed that 80 per cent of women in the UK do not shower every day. And a third go for three days without washing, according to the survey by skincare range Flint Plus Flint.

The stereotype of the Gallic unwashed appears to have travelled back to the US after the Second World War. American GIs were shocked to discover that France’s still largely rural population, who had little access to hot running water, did not prioritise washing.

In 1945 the US army gave a handbook to their soldiers answering their questions about French people, entitled 112 Gripes About The French. The question and answer-style manual included the gripe ‘the French don’t wash’.

The government book said French women were forced to mask uncleanliness with scent. And it claimed the French washed less than Americans because they were poorer – and because the Germans had deprived them of soap.