Handwashing can save lives
DEATHS caused by diarrhoeal diseases can be decreased by 50% if people practised proper hand hygiene daily.
This is according to the Northern Cape MEC for Health, Mase Manopole, who was speaking during the commemoration of Global Handwashing Day this week.
Manopole said that the use of clean water and soap to wash hands could easily prevent the transmission of certain diseases.
“The Northern Cape Department of Health adopted a Provincial Implementation Plan (PIP) in February 2018, which is aligned to the ‘National Hand Hygiene Behaviour Change Strategy 2016-2020’. The aim of the plan is to facilitate the full implementation of the National Hand Hygiene Behaviour Change Strategy in society to lower morbidity and mortality related to water, sanitation and hygiene associated with diseases, especially in children under five years of age. This strategy is even more relevant to our Province, which is confronted with multiple diseases such as tuberculosis, diarrhoea and other opportunistic infections. The successful implementation of this strategy will reduce the mortality rate of respiratory disease by 25% and deaths by diarrhoeal disease by 50%. Provincial statistics for the period 2018/19 depict that 24 children under the age of five died as a result of diarrhoea,” said Manopole.
She advised that handwashing should be practised and encouraged daily.
“Improved hand hygiene depends on a better understanding of the risks associated with poor hygiene as well as access to proper sources of adequate clean water, soap and operational sanitation that is safe to use, properly maintained and easily accessible by all community members. Washing hands with water only will not be as effective in removing germs as when using clean water and soap. The importance of better infrastructure provision and infrastructure maintenance, as well as the transferral of information and knowledge to communities in the Province,will eventually lead to a lower prevalence of diarrhoea related illnesses,” she said.