Help Prevent Infection – Wash Your Hands
May 10th, 2009
Scientists believe that 80% of disease is spread by not enough or improper hand washing. 80% is a huge number in my opinion. That also suggests how much we can prevent by thorough hand washing. I would much rather see disease prevention, so it would be great to see everyone washing their hands very thoroughly and frequently. My skin is very dry, so I have hand lotion with me all the time to put on my hands after washing. I also carry hand sanitizer as an extra precaution.
I’ve also heard people question some things like shaking hands. Should we bow when greeting someone rather than shaking hands? Something like that would take a long time for people to change. Even if that did change, that is not the only way the germs spread. We sneeze or cough, cover our mouth with our hand, then open a door to go in or out. That is one small example out of the many items we touch daily. Not shaking hands is not enough of an answer. Washing our hands more often and more thoroughly is.
The CDC has a video that shows the importance of hand washing here.