Its World Hand Wash day today: All you need about its importance in this pandemic.
By Ishank Katyal
Ever thought that doing small things after working, playing or using toilet can help you to protect yourself and your family from respiratory and diarrheal diseases like influenza, chicken pox, Hepatitis A, Common Cold and cough, diarrhea, and of course last but not the least COVID- 19.
World Hand Wash Day is celebrated on 15th October every year. This day is celebrated to spread the awareness about health hygiene and how important it is to wash our hands using soap or hand wash and water as hands play the vital role as hands are the most common medium of virus and bacteria because we use them the most to cover our face while sneezing and coughing.
If we talk about novel coronavirus pandemic, using a hand wash or hand sanitizer is the easiest yet the cheapest way to protect yourself from the deadly virus till the vaccine enters the market.
For how long we should wash our hands?
According to health experts, one should wash his or her hands properly for at least 20-30 seconds in regular intervals to avoid contracting COVID- 19.
After touching surfaces including money, coughing, sneezing, using public transportation, visiting public places, washing hands is a must.
Importance of having clean hands:
- Washing hands can reduce the risk of infection by diarrhea by about 23-40% and 58% for the people with low immunity.
- Reduce the risk of getting infected from respiratory diseases by 16- 21%.
- Control the absenteeism due to gastrointestinal illness in school children by 29- 57%.