It’s one of those things where on paper, it’s supposed to be as stringent as medical settings, but in reality it amounts to exactly what you said: they aren’t washing their hands.

But, truth be told, there’s some places where people don’t change gloves between food stations, which is even worse than just switching gloves without washing. It all comes down to who is running the kitchen. A good manager/chef is on top of things, and the methed out, sleep deprived, half drunk crew are following procedure well. Otherwise, things fall through the cracks a lot because there’s a degree of similarity between a kitchen during a rush and an ER on a busy night, without the extra training and entrenchment of germ theory to help the kitchen staff stay mindful.

I’ve done both, though I avoided any hospital work as much as I could, and also avoided any kitchen work I couldn’t walk away from at a whim. It’s honestly easier to remember to keep things right in an ER because the work flow is built around it more. Even with having done grunt level medical stuff, I would be more likely to not hand wash in a kitchen and just swap gloves because most kitchens aren’t set up where you can do it without breaking your flow. Dedicated hand washing stations/sinks just don’t exist. You have to walk away from the work to wash.

Now, even in bad kitchens, you’ll be washing your hands throughout a shift, it just won’t be between stations/jobs. It won’t be every ten minutes like in a facility of one type or another lol.

But holy crap, do I get queasy watching someone eat with gloves on. I know damn good and well those gloves are nasty as hell. No way.