Question: people say a dogs mouth is cleaner than a humans is it true?

Louise Walkin answered on 12 Nov 2012:

I’m not actually sure! I’m not really a dog person but if you compare it to a cat instead. Cats lick themselves (including their bottoms!!) and their paws. We don’t do any of that but we do carry many germs / bacteria on our hands. We eat with our hands some of the time – something a dog wouldn’t really do. We put pens in our mouths, but then dogs / cats carry their toys etc as a comparison. We brush our teeth – something that dogs and cats don’t really do on a daily basis. Both dogs and cats have enzymes in our saliva that breakdown bacteria to some extent. It probably depends on what type of dog you have and it’s personality!! It would an interesting experiment to take saliva from a dog and a human and compare the bacteria that is found in each one! 🙂