The CDC is warning people to stop reusing and washing condoms - here's why it's dangerous

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Don't reuse condoms. Seriously.

• The Center for Disease Control warned about the dangers of reusing condoms in a recent tweet.
• Condoms are designed to help protect you and your partner against sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
• Reusing condoms makes them completely ineffective, according to experts.

Reusing and recycling household items is an easy way to do your part to help save the environment.

But the Center for Disease Control (CDC) took the unprecedented step to warn about the dangers of reusing one particular item: condoms.

"We say it because people do it: Don't wash or reuse #condoms! Use a fresh one for each #sex act," The CDC tweeted in July.

Condoms are designed to help protect you and your sexual partner from spreading sexually transmitted diseases, like syphilis or chlamydia, as well as unwanted pregnancy.

The effectiveness of condoms, however, is eliminated after the first use.

"Incorrect use, such as reusing a condom or using more than one at a time, diminishes the protective effect of condoms by leading to condom breakage, slippage, or leakage," Dr. Elizabeth Torrone, an epidemiologist at the CDC's Division of STD Prevention, told Buzzfeed.

Simply washing a condom with soap won't kill any bacteria or virus lurking on the condom's surface - meaning, it's pretty much useless.

Putting a wet, unrolled condom back on would also be a Herculean task.

If that's not enough to encourage you to throw your old condoms in the trash and rely on fresh ones instead, then maybe the alarming rise in cases of super gonorrhea, an antibiotic-resistant strain of the bug, will.