Washing your hands is a simple, routine action, but it is the most powerful way to prevent the spread of disease.
Global Handwashing Day is celebrated every year on 15 October to highlight how washing hands with soap and water can effectively prevent the spread of illness and infection.
“There is an international drive to reduce the spread of disease among populations and encourage healthy handwashing practices, particularly in lower-income countries,” explains Christine Smedley, Infection Prevention and Control Officer at Mediclinic Southern Africa.
Even when people have soap and water at hand, they don’t always perform hand hygiene as they should. Many people became almost obsessive about hygiene during the COVID-19 pandemic but have now returned to lazy habits.
“Correct handwashing with soap and water can prevent transmission of influenzas as well as diarrhoeal disease,” she says. “The faecal-oral route of transmission is a particular problem. Children must be taught to wash their hands regularly, especially after going to the toilet. Because of the over-exposure to antibiotics, a lot of drug-resistant organisms exist in our communities, especially gut bacteria. By not washing your hands regularly, you increase the risk of significant infections that are difficult to treat.”
Basics of hand hygiene
Ideally, you should wash your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and clean water, says Smedley. “You must wash all areas of your hands, including nails and between fingers by applying soap and friction from handwashing to cover all areas of the skin and to remove any transient organisms that are on the surfaces of your hands.”
Whenever you have any visible dirt or soiling on your skin, handwashing is essential. Alcohol-based hand rub is extremely effective to kill harmful bacteria and can be used at any time. However, it is not effective when organic material and dirt is present, says Smedley.
You might have seen healthcare professionals washing their hands and forearms in a special way before surgery. This process, called a surgical scrub, involves using an antimicrobial soap and washing for a longer period than usual to get rid of germs on their skin. There’s an alcohol-based option for this, but it’s not yet as commonly used.
Smedley also advises washing your hands with soap and water after touching blood or bodily fluids.
Infection control
Hand hygiene in the healthcare environment is necessary to control or reduce the spread of infection. Healthcare workers must wash their hands between patients to prevent spreading germs from one patient to another. This is especially important because many patients have weakened immune systems and are more likely to get infections
“Staff at all Mediclinic facilities practise routine hand hygiene at specific moments throughout their working day, either to prevent transmission of micro-organisms from patient to patient or from the environment to patients,” says Smedley. “This reduces the risk of introducing organisms into a wound or via an invasive device such as an intravenous line (drip) into a patient’s bloodstream, or via a urinary catheter, for example. There are also strict protocols for cleaning the environment and decontaminating equipment.”
Encouraging effective handwashing practices is also critical in areas where lots of people share facilities, such as schools, after-care centres, mental health facilities, gyms, and correctional services.
“During seasonal influenza outbreaks, you can increase your chances of staying healthier with regular handwashing,” says Smedley. This also applies to emerging diseases, particularly those that involve a skin condition and vesicles (small liquid-filled sacs formed by a membrane). These include chicken pox and M-Pox.