Global hand washing day 15, October ============================== On 15 October, every year, the global hand washing day is celebrated the world over. In India this year it is very special because our Prime Minister Modi has given a clarion call for Swachh Bharat abhiyan (clean India campaign). Why the hand washing is so important especially after defecation and before meal ? The emphasis is on washing hands with soap to make our hand clean and that too germs and bacteria- free. It is important as well as necessary to wash hands with soap particularly “after defecation and before meal” to reduce the fecal oral route transmission diseases by preventing germs, bacteria and virus to arrive at our mouth and stomach. It is the hands, which carry bacteria and germs with it when we eat food and reach our mouth and from here entered into our stomach, thus causing a number of intestinal diseases like diarrhea, gastro-intestinal, jaundice and typhoid. In our rural households and slums people do not have toilet facilities; hence most of them defecate on open. The open defecators generally do not have the system and habits to wash hands with soap; albeit they wash hands with mud as most of them either defecate in and around the water sources, on village paths, roads and railway lines etc. Therefore, the need is to construct household latrines, so that the human excretes is disposed off safely as well as to control the diseases caused by it. Hence hand washing and availability of toilets are interconnected. The studies show that in India and South East Asia, off the total diseases, 80% are of intestinal mainly caused by dirtiness that is due to open defecation and polluted water. The coliform level, which shows the quantity of fecal, of our water sources as well as river water is increasing and in certain areas are far beyond the permissive limit. The recent UNO survey also indicate that over 65 million children below 5 years in India are malnourished not because of lack of food but because of dirtiness due to open defecation. So in India the importance of global hand washing day should be seen in this background and Swachh Bharat Abhiyan should not remain as symbolic as is feared by some experts. – Ranveer Singh Rana
Posted on: Tue, 14 Oct 2014 14:55:58 +0000
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