Global Handwashing Day Highlights Importance of Clean Hands

On Oct. 15 each year, Global Handwashing Day raises awareness about the importance of handwashing with soap and water. The 2024 Global Handwashing Day theme is “Why are clean hands still important?”

Handwashing with soap and water is one of the simplest, most effective ways to stop the spread of germs and stay healthy, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Keeping hands clean can help prevent diarrheal illnesses and respiratory infections, such as the common cold or flu.

Handwashing with soap and water is simple and inexpensive, and it can significantly reduce the number of young children who get sick. Teaching people about handwashing helps them and their communities stay healthy. Studies show that handwashing education in the community can:

• Reduce the number of people who get sick with diarrhea by about 23%–40%.
• Reduce the number of school days children missed because of gastrointestinal illness by 29%–57%.
• Reduce diarrheal illness in people with weakened immune systems by about 58%.
• Reduce respiratory illnesses, like colds, in the general population by about 16%–21%.

Global Handwashing Day was founded in 2008 by the Global Handwashing Partnership, and is an opportunity to design, test, and replicate creative ways to encourage people to wash their hands with soap at critical times.

No matter your role, you can celebrate Global Handwashing Day. The Global Handwashing Partnership offers these tools for support:

• Global Handwashing Day planner’s tools
• Handwashing information
• Responses to frequently asked questions

In Bradley Co.’s Healthy Handwashing Survey™, this year nearly all Americans (95%) believe handwashing is important in maintaining overall health. Additionally, the survey found:

• Engaging in handwashing makes us feel safer and healthier–72% associate at least one of those feelings in the moment immediately after handwashing.
• Adult respondents, who are parents, work to instill this cleanliness habit in their children–63% ask their children to wash their hands, 39% buy fun soaps, and 30% incorporate it into their routine. 
• Americans wash their hands 89% of the time after using a public restroom. The majority of those who skipped the cleansing step cited a lack of soap or paper towels while others claimed nonworking sinks hampered their efforts.

“The aim of our survey is to keep the health benefits of handwashing with soap top-of-mind, especially as we head into cold and flu season,” said Jon Dommisse, Bradley vice president of business development and strategy. “Celebrating Global Handwashing Day is a natural outgrowth of that mission. This day is also an excellent reminder for facilities to provide clean, well-stocked, and maintained restrooms that support handwashing with soap.”