World Hand Washing Day

Remember that famous advertisement where Bunty was asked, ‘Tera sabun slow hai kya?’ Or the many others during the pandemic that emphasised the importance of washing hands for 20 seconds? These ads were some of the best examples of how hand washing helps maintain personal hygiene. Let's understand this using Ali’s example. 

Ali Asgar, a 35-year-old living in Mumbai, works as a healthcare professional in one of the city's reputed hospitals. When asked about a routine he holds dear, Ali highlighted the importance of washing his hands. He does it consistently and diligently before and after every patient interaction. He mentioned how this simple yet efficient practice helps him protect himself and his patients from contact with germs. This example also shows how this small action can positively impact public health. 

To further encourage this seemingly little exercise, World Handwashing Day serves as a reminder. It aims to highlight the importance of Global Handwashing Day and enhance awareness of the importance of using water and soap. 

World Handwashing Day: Meaning & History

World or Global Handwashing Day, celebrated on 15th October each year, is an annual event designed to support handwashing. The day highlights how something simple as handwashing using a bar of soap can be a quick and affordable way to save lives and prevent countless diseases. 

Launched by the Global Handwashing Partnership, the day is an opportunity to create and encourage people to wash their hands.¹ The World Handwashing Day was first celebrated in 2008. Around 120 million children from more than 70 countries who were washing their hands with soap participated in the event. Since then, national and international governments have been using this day to create awareness about hand hygiene and the importance of the same. Today, various organisations like governments, NGOs, schools, and civil societies participate in and endorse this event.¹ 

Why Global Handwashing Day?

As mentioned, Global Handwashing Day is a gentle reminder of the importance of clean hands. This helps us prevent germs. Further, handwashing using simple soap and water is quite simple and affordable. Still not convinced? Here are some pointers to help you believe a simple act can bring significant differences. 

1. The global diarrhoea cases can be reduced by 23% to 40% using handwashing education.
2. Handwashing education can also come in handy to lessen the number of missed school days by kids by around 29% to 57%.
3. Diarrhoea  in individuals with weak immunity can be lowered by about 58%.
4. Handwashing can also help reduce respiratory conditions by about 16% to 21%.

The Importance and Benefits of Clean Hands?

As mentioned, clean and washed hands are among the best and easiest defences against infections, bacteria, and other germs. So, whether you're in business, school, or hospital, handwashing can help you produce better outcomes anywhere. Here are some of the benefits of clean hands:

1. Hand hygiene can come in handy in lowering the rate of Neglected Tropical Diseases. 
2. Clean hands are also a defense against health-related infections. 
3. Clean hands can help lower the transmission rate of several diseases, including cholera, COVID-19, Ebola, and monkeypox. 

Here is how clean hands can help several institutions:

• Clean Hands = Happy Government 

The government can benefit in several ways by promoting clean hands and hand hygiene.

1. First, it can improve global health. 
2. Second, it reduces a nation's vulnerability to several deadly diseases. 
3. Further, it also helps lessen the burden on national healthcare services. 
4. Promoting hand hygiene can improve healthcare and communities' overall health and well-being.

• Clean Hands = Better Businesses 

While it may not look clear and direct to you, hand hygiene can also help businesses in several ways.

1. Encouraging hand hygiene can reduce the spread of infections, leading to fewer employees being sick and, thus, reduced sick leaves
2. This can also help improve employee productivity
3. Promoting hand hygiene can also reduce the burden of hygiene-preventable healthcare claims by 20%
4. Better hand hygiene and safety standards can help you build a brand reputation

What is the Theme for Global Handwashing Day 2024?

Every year, governments and international institutions collaborate to announce a theme for World Handwashing Day. The theme for 2024 is “Why are Clean Hands Still Important?” 

Are Global Handwashing Day and Global Handwashing Hygiene Day the Same?

Though both events revolve around raising hand hygiene awareness, Global Handwashing Day and Global Hand Hygiene Day differ. Global Handwashing Day is celebrated on the 15th of October, while Global Hand Hygiene Day is on the 5th of May. 

Global Handwashing Day highlights the importance of washing hands using soap and water. Alternatively, Global Hand Hygiene Day raises awareness of the importance of sharing knowledge about hand hygiene. 

The themes of both events are also different. The theme for World Handwashing Day 2024 is “Why are Clean Hands Still Important.” On the other hand, the theme for World Hand Hygiene Day 2024 is “Why is sharing knowledge about hand hygiene still so important?” Global Hand Hygiene Day aims to boost the knowledge and capacity of healthcare workers and other important individuals via proper training and education on hand hygiene and preventing infections.

Listed below are the objectives of Hand Hygiene Day for 2024:

1. To improve learning patterns and help successful implementation of infection prevention and hand hygiene among healthcare workers
2. Give better access to training resources on hand hygiene 
3. Encourage awareness of hand hygiene and knowledge sharing
4. To encourage evaluation mechanisms to measure the efficiency and performance of the provided training

Clean Hands, Healthier Future

Understanding the importance of clean hands and hand hygiene is the first step toward your safety. To ensure the campaign runs successfully, each individual and stakeholder must play their part. If there are young children in the family or around you, you can take some time to educate them. Setting hourly alarms to watch hands can be a fun family activity. For someone who is social-media savvy, you can also use such platforms to educate your followers and audience on the importance of handwashing. You can post catchy stories and posts. 

Consider putting stories around the steps to wash your hands, critical times when you should be washing hands, why to wash your hands, the importance of hand sanitiser, and much more. Clean hands are your first line of defence towards a safe and healthy future. Besides that, consider insuring yourself. Health insurance ensures that you have a safety net in case of medical emergencies where you don't have to worry about your medical expenses. 

Care Health Insurance offers a variety of options ranging from Individual Health plans to Family health plans. Care Advantage is one of the best policies for insuring yourself, given the rise in infections and lifestyle diseases. With a high sum insured of up to ₹1 crore, the plan ensures your protection against any medical urgency. It offers comprehensive coverage that includes hospitalisation expenses, daycare treatment, and much more to provide quality treatment with utmost peace of mind and no financial hurdles. 

>> Also Read: Benefits to Maintain Personal Hygiene Routine

Disclaimers: Plan features, benefits, coverage, and claims underwriting are subject to policy terms and conditions. Kindly refer to the brochure, sales prospectus, and policy documents carefully.

References:

https://globalhandwashing.org/global-handwashing-day/about-ghd/

https://www.cdc.gov/clean-hands/globalhandwashingday/index.html

https://globalhandwashing.org/resources/global-handwashing-day-2024-fact-sheet/

https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-hand-hygiene-day/2024