👏🏽Wash your filthy hands🖕🏽
Wash your hands
In 1847, Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis suggested to his colleagues (in the business of medicine), that mortality rates could be reduced, by washing their gore smeared hands before plunging them inside the next patient in line. He was duly ridiculed (and probably presented with more than a few bloody middle fingers). He'd figured this out from his observational deductions, working in obstetrics (this and surgery being his areas of expertise), yet it wasn't something he was able to incorporate into a detailed, theoretical explanation. His logic went against the accepted views of the age, causing the medical community to reject his idea outright. Doctors and surgeons were held in high regard at this time, owing to rapidly evolving knowledge and a consequentially growing number of patients surviving previously mortal events. Many took offence at Semmelweis's suggestions, mocking him and causing him and his hair brained notions to become the resident laughing stock.
Meanwhile he extended his theory to the washing of all obstetric equipment, virtually eliminating previously common and often fatal postpartum infection (puerperal/childbed fever) at the Hungarian hospital. 18 long years of belittlement and bullying proved to be too much. Colleagues committed him to an asylum following a nervous breakdown, where he'd pass away after 2 weeks of brutal treatment by the facility's guards.
It was his wartime experiences that led Louis Pasteur to confirm the validity of germ theory as the century neared it's end, providing the scientific theory that Semmelweis (in his time), simply couldn't. At last, hand-washing obtained widespread acceptance. Noted English surgeon Joseph Lister went on to successfully pioneer antiseptic surgical methods, many of which (in conjunction with the use of antibiotics and aseptic process) continue saving lives to this day.
Hands are disgusting.
Our hands are instruments of death! Perhaps not in the way that Bruce Lee's hands were, but effective nonetheless. Think about the many places you're aware that they touch each day. Now, consider how that constitutes less than half of your total contact with surfaces, objects, devices, people and significantly, yourself. Much of this occurs without our conscious minds even realising, making it rather difficult (but not impossible) to prevent.
Recent samples taken from McDonald's drive-thru ordering touchscreens and from bank A.T.M.s revealed that they were covered in human faecal particles! It's reasonable to believe the majority of other such facilities for public use, are equally contaminated. Door handles are touched by countless hands successively, which is why hospitals often feature swing doors. You might have seen staff push them open using just their hips, hands well out of the way. Our hands are also tasked with managing another utterly disgusting everyday object... money! Both coins and paper notes pass between hands more times than can be imagined during it's lifetime. A huge number of those hands will be rather less than sterile and who can overlook the way that money is sometimes stowed in (shall we say) unseemly locations about their person. I personally know of banknotes being used as makeshift toilet tissue. Do you still plan on rolling one up to partake of a "livener" this weekend? The most dangerous and revolting threats are usually those we can't see.
And the really grim news..
Last summer, the University of Surrey in partnership with Denmark's Bispebjerg hospital revealed that nearly half of toilet users at the medical facility, failed to wash their hands between flushing and exiting the area. I've seen even higher figures, but this study didn't rely on self-reporting. Instead sensors were installed on toilet and sink pipes to monitor hygiene behaviours. Measuring around 2,600 flushes, 43.7% skipped hand washing, rising to 61.8% on some of the trial's 19 weeks duration.
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