The Importance of Hand washing

By Hannah P

I know what you're thinking, not a lecture on hand washing! But… Can you think of all the times where you have just skipped washing your hands before dinner? Or just glanced at the faucet and said, “What’s the point in washing my hands anyway?” This article is going to be all about how you should wash your hands, when you should wash your hands and why you should wash your hands in the first place.

So the first thing you are most likely going to ask yourself now is, why should I wash my hands? Well, because it stops germs from spreading. Not washing your hands might be the reason you get sick, or your friends and family get sick. Let’s think of an analogy for this. Oh, I know! It’s like if there is a villain in your favorite superhero book, and your favorite hero just came in and stopped the bad guy! Well, in this case, the germs are like the bad guys; they are the evil germs who started this whole pandemic. Think about it, if we had washed our hands more often, we might not even be in this situation right now. So, continue on reading, and learn how and when you should wash your hands.

Now it is time to learn how you should wash your hands. But first, we all need to take a little trip back to preschool when we first learned to wash our hands. Do you remember learning to wash your hands? I don’t. But I do it every day, so it must have become such a regular routine, whether I was doing it correctly or not.

The CDC (Center for Disease Control) recommends that you wash your hands for 20 seconds, with soap and water. You can wash your hands with bar soap or liquid soap. You can wash your hands with warm or cold water (it doesn’t actually work better if you use warm water as previously believed). But no matter what, wash your hands with soap and water. I say this because want to know what actually kills the germs? Friction. Friction actually rubs the germs off of your hands and pushes it down the sink. Water rinses off the soap and the germs down the sink, so you don’t have to have the soap on your hands all day.

When do you think you should wash your hands? Probably not as often as you need to. Below is a list of the times when you should wash your hands:

1. After you go to the bathroom

2. Before and after you cook

3. Before and after you eat

4. After you go outside

5. After you see dirt on your hands

6. After you use technology (computer, iPad, phone, etc. )

7. Before and after you blow your nose.

8. After you sneeze or cough

Through all these times of the day, you should wash your hands between 6-10 times a day. Wow, even I was surprised by that one, 10 times a day! Who washes their hands that much?

In conclusion, I would like to emphasize how important it is to wash your hands more often. Washing your hands is going to help stop the pandemic! If everyone wears masks, stays six or more feet apart, and washes their hands, we might just be able to get Covid- 19 under control.