October 15 is a marked day in the calendar as the celebration of the World Day Handwashing, one day last year was commemorated in a special way because of the pandemic coronavirus and the importance of washing hands to avoid contagion. Let us now know why the World Handwashing Day and what is the theme for this 2021.
World Handwashing Day: Why is it celebrated on October 15?
One of the most repeated actions in the last year and a half to stop the coronavirus has been washing hands. In fact, since the WHO declared the pandemic in early 2020, it also recommended that one of the ways to stop the SARS-CoV-2 virus was to wash your hands well with soap and water.
An act that we now do much more than before, although it has always been known that hand washing is important to prevent the spread of infection and keep people healthy. According to UNICEF, simply washing your hands after using the bathroom or before eating can reduce the risk of children getting diarrhea by more than 40%. Additionally, it says that in times of COVID-19, hand washing is likely to reduce the chances of COVID-19 infection by 36 percent.
But why is there a day dedicated to hand washing? World Handwashing Day was established by the Global Handwashing Partnership, an alliance of several international associations that work in a concrete way to promote the importance of washing hands with soap. It is celebrated every October 15 with the aim of educating people that washing hands with soap is perhaps one of the simplest ways to prevent diseases and thereby save lives.
The first time World Handwashing Day was celebrated was in 2008, when more than 120 million children around the world washed their hands with soap in more than 70 countries. Since then the celebration of this day has been increasing and has the support of governments, schools, international institutions, civil society organizations, NGOs, private companies, individuals and more.
What is the theme of World Handwashing Day 2021?
Every year, World Handwashing Day is celebrated with a theme and this year’s theme is “Our future is at hand: let’s move forward together” and refers to what has been learned from Covid-19 and the need to a collective action to address the few investments, policies and programs on hand hygiene that still exist in the world. An issue that inspires us to go beyond what has been learned from the coronavirus and that everyone commits to carry out a coordinated action towards universal hand hygiene.
How to wash your hands properly
Now we already know the reason for this world day dedicated to washing hands, an action that surely we have all increased as a result of the pandemic and that we already know how to do correctly although it will not hurt to review it based on what the WHO indicates about correct hand hygiene. These are the steps:
- Wet your hands with water
- Apply enough soap to cover all surfaces of your hands
- Rub your hands palm to palm
- Rub the right palm over the left hand, fingers intertwined and vice versa
- Rub palms to palms, fingers intertwined
- Back of fingers
- Rotational rubbing of the left and right thumbs
- Rotary rub on each palm
- Rinse with water
- Dry well with a clean towel
- Use the towel to turn off the tap.
