Emphasizing The Importance Of Washing Hands – Handwashing Day

By Raj | Oct 15, 2009

Untidy hands, unhygienic practices and poor sanitation facilitate the spread of parasites pinworm, roundworm and whipworm and promote epidemics like diarrhea, typhoid, cholera or respiratory infections like SARS. According to UNICEF, more than 5,000 children under the age of five die every day as a result of diarrheal diseases, caused in part by unsafe water, lack of access to basic sanitation facilities and poor hygiene. Studies have proven that effective hand washing – for at least 20 seconds – with soap, could reduce the death tolls from diarrheal diseases by about 50 percent. So half of those lives could be saved if children would only wash their hands before eating and after going to the toilet, the single most inexpensive health intervention in the world.

To emphasize the importance of washing hands and to spread the message that many diseases could be prevented if more people would wash their hands with soap, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), has called for action today, October 15, as Global Hand Washing Day.

If you’re still not aware of the importance of washing hands, it would be worth reading the health impact of handwashing with soap and the effect of handwashing on child health.

Convinced? May we too join in this global public-private partnership along with WHO, UNICEF and other organizations in the fight to save children’s lives by spreading the message that many diseases could be prevented if more people would wash their hands with soap? If you haven’t yet educated the importance of washing hands to the kids in your family, do it on this Global Handwashing Day, and it would be worth encouraging them to watch the video below.