If you use a loofah to get clean, it may be time to rethink your shower routine.

That spongy, handheld scrubber meant to exfoliate and lather suds around your naked body is actually the perfect home for bacteria. A 1994 study published in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology showed that the popular beauty accessory and were talking the kind made from actual cucumbers, not plastic mesh can host and transmit pseudomonas aeruginosa, a bacterium that can cause disease in animals.

Loofahs are hygienic to start out with, Esther Angert, Ph.D., associate professor in the department of microbiology at Cornell University, tells The Huffington Post. Its how they are maintained that will affect their longevity.

Your loofah scrubs dead skin cells off of your body, which get caught in all of the nooks and crannies of the fibrous matrix of the loofah, she explains. When youre done scrubbing, chances are you leave the loofah in the bathroom until its next use. This is the opportune moment for bacteria to cultivate. The shower environment is a nice, humid environment theres not a lot of air circulation, and its a great place for bacteria to hang out, she says. The bacteria eat any organic matter like those discarded skin cells left behind in the loofah.

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