Are Wire Grill Cleaning Brushes Dangerous?
We asked experts, and the short answer is yes.
Helin Loik-Tomson/Getty Images
As the weather warms and grilling season nears, you may be readying your grill for action. But now and throughout barbecue season, you’ll want to be very careful what tools you use to clean it, experts warn. Bottom line: Stay away from grill brushes that have metal wire bristles.
“Do not use grill brushes with metal wires,” emphasizes pediatric emergency medicine doctor Meghan Martin in a viral TikTok video that has garnered 43.4 million views since 2023. “There’s not only the risk that they can get lodged [in] soft tissues on your throat, but they can also cause bowel obstructions and perforations in the abdomen if accidentally swallowed, and … they get mixed in the hamburger or the meat that’s getting cooked on the grill.”
In the video, Martin shares the story of a 4-year-old boy who presented at her emergency room with a two-centimeter-long metal wire lodged in his “peritonsillar tissues,” which had caused an abscess. The little boy had surgery to remove the wire and drain the abscess, started a course of antibiotics, and ultimately recovered.
“The problem with these wire brush bristles or brushes is that they start to migrate once they get stuck,” says Dr. Steven Sungmin Hong, a head and neck surgeon at Atrium Health in Charlotte, North Carolina. “So it’s like a slow-moving bullet, where it doesn’t necessarily stay in one spot.”
Hong says that can make the bristles, which can be “as fine as a hair” very difficult to see in the first place, challenging to remove. Once a bristle “starts to travel,” he explains, “it may not be where you initially thought it was by the time you get to the operating room.”
While the metal bristles can get lodged into pretty much anything you grill, Hong mentions that beef patties present the biggest danger. “The way the beef is clumped together, it kind of grabs onto these bristles versus things like hot dogs and chicken.” The situation he most often sees with wire-grill brush injuries is that someone has eaten a burger and then experiences a sharp pain in their tongue or mouth either while eating or soon afterward. A bristle can also migrate down and lodge into the abdomen, where it can be particularly dangerous, he says. “The biggest issue is infection. It can create a little hole in your GI tract, in your stomach. Bacteria can then travel out to your intra-abdominal space, which is supposed to be completely sterile.”
If left untreated, that infection can lead to serious health issues or even death. So Dr. Hong urges anyone who fears they may have swallowed a wire bristle or experiences pain after eating a burger cooked on a grill that has been cleaned with a wire grill brush to seek medical help as soon as possible. But don’t freak out. Once treated, people usually fully recover without continuing issues.
So if you can’t safely use a wire-bristle brush to clean your grill, what should you use? Hong uses a “steam and sponge” grill brush, but adds that a nylon-bristle brush or metal coil brush is fine too. He has yet to see any injuries resulting from those.
And if you do use a wire grill brush, Hong says, “The best way to prevent any injuries is to clean your grill with soap and water and really get the gunk off there, because that’s really where the brushes get caught up.”
Maciek Zurawski, who blogs about barbecue at Grilling With Dad, also steers clear of metal-wire grill brushes. “There are several great alternatives to keeping your grill clean without having to worry about eating something you’re not supposed to,” he says.
Zurawski prefers to use a solid brush with a stainless-steel chainmail, like this one. “There are no bristles, and the chainmail does a great job of cleaning the grill,” he says. A wooden grill brush is also “great for scraping your grates without having to worry about metal bristles.”
“Whichever product you decide to use, it’s always best to clean your grill immediately after using it. All the burnt bits, sauce residue, etc… will come off much easier when everything is still warm,” Zurawski advises. “If you let it sit for a few days, it will be much more difficult to scrape it clean.”
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