Legionella are the kind of bacteria that we most certainly do not want to enter the human organism. When showering, for example, they are flushed out of the shower head in tiny water droplets and can be inhaled. Some of them are transported unnoticed into our lungs and deposited there via the respiratory tract. For healthy people without any kind of immune deficiency, legionella cannot do much harm. But the situation is different for people with a weakened immune system.
To avoid getting sick in the first place, it is important to completely replace the water in the pipes after a long period of downtime – for example, in a holiday home that has been unoccupied for months. “Water in our drinking water pipes must be replaced after 72 hours at the latest, otherwise the pipes quickly become a paradise for germs and bacteria such as legionella due to stagnant water and temperatures between 25 and 45°C,” reports Beat Aebi, Product Manager Piping Systems International at Geberit.