This is how you should wash your hands
One of the most important precautions to take during the Covid-19 pandemic is to regularly wash your hands with soap and water. However, according to experts, most people are doing it wrong.
There is an exact hand-washing method that must be followed to kill all the living germs and bacteria on your skin.
Research indicates that you need to know how to wash your hands properly to prevent the virus from spreading, protecting yourself and the community you live in.
The New York Times explains this exact hand-washing method. You have to wet your hands first, then apply enough soap and start washing vigorously for 20 full seconds. Make sure you wash the back of your hands, between every finger, both thumbs, under all nails, fingertips and on your wrists as well. Dry your hands with a clean towel and use the towel to turn off the tap.
There are also specific times when you need to wash your hands:
- Before you leave the house
- When you arrive at your destination
- Before and after you eat or prepare food
- Before and after you clean your home
- After you blow your nose, cough or sneeze
- After you use the bathroom or change a diaper
- After you feed or touch a pet
It is, furthermore, very important to avoid unnecessarily touching surfaces and objects.
Dr Asaf Bitton, a primary-care physician, public-health researcher, and the director of the Ariadne Labs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in the United States, told The New Yorker that people are not well-informed about how long the Coronavirus can live on various surfaces.
“It sounds extreme, but we do know that it lives on surfaces for a long time. Some studies have found nine days, some studies have found three days, and we don’t clean those surfaces regularly. You will want to not touch those surfaces,” he said to the New Yorker.
Dr Adit Ginde, professor of emergency medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, explained the urgent importance of the correct hand-washing method and hand hygiene to the New York Times. “Your hands carry almost all germs to your respiratory tract. Keeping them as clean as possible is really helpful. It would dramatically reduce transmission if people did it well.”
