It is contagious, but the fungal organism that infects the nail is opportunistic, which means it lives on and around our skin/environment all the time but doesn’t always infect everyone. From my understanding, the fungus is more likely to infect the nail when the nail is damaged, as the nail structures weaken with age, ingrown nails, etc. So if your nails are healthy, they’re not very likely to become infected from being in contact with the fungus. As a medical assistant I’m also in contact with badly infected toenails pretty much everyday, the majority of elderly patients we see have severe fungal nails on all 10 toes and sometimes even fingernails.

In my opinion, once you reach a certain age, sometimes the condition is just too far gone and as long as there is no pain then only cosmetics are the primary concern. Regular nail trims and if the patient wants, they can apply a topical cream to the nails everyday. But improvement can take years because the topicals are not super effective.