Hand washing and Hand Hygiene. Why?
You might already had been bombarded with these two terms: Hand washing and Hand hygiene. These two are given importance in today's generation now that we are still not done with the Coronavirus pandemic due to it's ability to mutate. Hand washing is the process of rubbing your hands methodically using soap and water for around 40-60 seconds while hand hygiene is rubbing your hands methodically for at least 20-30 seconds with a hand sanitizer or a rubbing alcohol of more than 60% in order for it to be effective. Handwashing is the most preferable between the two because it decreases the microorganisms in your hands. Hand hygiene will kill the germs but it will not discard the killed germs that is why it is still essential to wash your hands with soap and water whenever you can access a source of clean water and soap.
Have you ever wondered why hand washing properly is effective in preventing the spread of infection? How are microorganisms dislodged from our hands while hand washing? According to NYTimes, microorganisms or germs are destroyed because the soap molecules has two parts: it has a head that goes well with water and a tail that is water-resistant and rather goes well with lipid instead. Now, some of the bacteria and viruses have a lipid membrane that protects them. What soap molecules do is that they breach the lipid membrane and destroy microorganism.
It is important to hand wash properly. I personally recommend hand washing whenever you can. Though it may not kill all the microorganisms in our hands, be informed that not all microorganisms are bad. We have friendly bacteria that resides in our skin which wards off opportunistic types. By constantly use hand sanitizers and bleach, we also eradicate this friendly bacteria.
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