How hand hygiene has evolved post Covid-19
Background:
- Hand hygiene has emerged as the hidden hero of public health in the wake of the historic COVID-19 pandemic, assiduously weaving itself into the fabric of our everyday lives with unmatched devotion. Hand washing, which was previously a mundane ritual, evolved into a ceremonial defence mechanism that served as a strong barrier against an unseen enemy.
Easy to use but effective tool:
- Handwashing became a basic but effective weapon in the pandemic’s toolbox of preventive efforts against the extremely contagious SARS-CoV-2 virus.
- As the pandemic spread, public health professionals and authorities around the world highlighted the importance of frequent handwashing as a critical procedure to lower transmission rates and shield people from infection.
- Hand washing is a straightforward solution that doesn’t call for a lot of resources. It is an essential practise that can dramatically lower the incidence of a number of illnesses, including upper respiratory tract infections, diarrheal illnesses, and the flu.
- In fact, especially in low- and middle-income nations, good handwashing has the potential to cut child mortality in half.
- In numerous poor nations, diarrheal illnesses continue to pose a substantial burden. Communities that practise better hand hygiene could see a minimum 50% decrease in these illnesses.
Getting schools going:
- Getting schools involved in these kinds of projects is essential to ensuring public knowledge is distributed widely. This entails advocating for these programmes as essential to general healthy behaviours in addition to integrating them into the curriculum.
- According to a 2019 World Health Organisation (WHO) report, poor hand hygiene practises were responsible for 20 million Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) and roughly 384,000 fatalities from diarrhoea.
- In October 2022, the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) carried out a thorough study in India with an emphasis on the bottleneck analysis of hand hygiene programmes. This issue was especially prominent in Africa and South-East Asia.
- The lack of funded initiatives to promote hand hygiene within the Departments of Women and Child Development, Health and Family Welfare, and Education was one of the study’s key findings.
Path ahead:
- To guarantee a coherent and successful communication plan regarding the significance of handwashing, the government must create a unified communication structure.
- This should entail an organised strategy, similar to a pyramid, that links tertiary care hospitals with grassroots ASHA workers.
- The government ought to make handwashing a key priority, taking cues from well-run previous initiatives like door-to-door polio immunisation drives and the “Hum Do Hamare Do” campaign for the two-child policy.
- The government has to focus on creating public restrooms and places to urinate, making sure that these facilities are not only accessible but also uphold strict hygienic guidelines.
- Moreover, it is essential to incorporate hand hygiene into the school curriculum. These behaviours can be formed early on and help us live long lives.
In summary:
- However, the availability of sufficient facilities and hygienic conditions in government-run educational institutions determines how effective such measures would be. It is essential that the government creates educational initiatives and makes the required infrastructure investments to support them.
