With the main flu and Norovirus season almost upon us, October is a good time to celebrate Global Handwashing Day, an event in which 200 million people in 100 countries around the world participate to promote hand hygiene.
Handwashing with soap is the most effective and inexpensive way to prevent diarrhoeal and acute respiratory infections in children, and turning it into an ingrained habit before eating and after using the toilet could save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention, the organisers say.
Encouraging the practice is not just an issue in the developing world where clean water is a scarce commodity and sanitation a luxury. Even in a modern country like the UK it seems to be a difficult habit to establish.
According to new research by Queen Mary, University of London and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, faecal bacteria are present on 26% of hands in the UK, on 14% of banknotes and 10% of credit cards. In some cases the quantity of germs is equivalent to those in a dirty toilet bowl.
And what’s more, we lie about handwashing. In a recent UK-wide survey 99% of people interviewed at motorway service stations claimed they had washed their hands after going to the toilet. But electronic recording devices revealed that only 32% of men and 64% of women actually had.
Quite why we are so bad at it is a mystery. There is evidence that some people may genuinely think they have washed their hands when they haven’t because they are acting on ‘autopilot’.
Education is all very well, but it doesn’t seem to be working. Perhaps social pressure – shaming people into good hygiene – might be more effective.