In the past few weeks, we’ve all heard several times that we should wash our hands with soap and water. Before COVID-19 began, no one thought twice about washing their hands. That is no longer the case. With the global increase in infections and fatalities as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, handwashing has become a constantly emphasized action. But why is handwashing actually so important?
Scientifically speaking, the soap you use when you wash your hands surrounds any bacteria and viruses on your hands. Soap molecules have hydrophobic tails, which do not like water. As they try to get away from the water, they wedge themselves into the membranes of bacteria and viruses, which causes the membranes to rupture. Soap also breaks the chemical bonds that allow bacteria, viruses, and other substances to stick to surfaces, which helps to lift them off your hands. This effectively kills the bacteria and harms the viruses, which are then washed away when you rinse off the soap.1
For me, handwashing was emphasized by my parents throughout my childhood. One of the principles of my faith, Sikhism, is maintaining cleanliness, both on the inside and the outside. You can’t be clean and free of vice on the inside if you don’t take care of your body on the outside. Washing your hands is a big part of this principle. I had to wash my hands whenever I did seva (a Sanskrit word meaning selfless service) at my local gurdwara, my faith’s house of worship. My parents would always say, and still do say “suchae hath naal,” which means “with clean hands.” As I’ve grown older, I’ve realized that this is more than just a logical thing to do; it is a morally right thing to do. If I’m doing selfless service, and I’m serving food or touching surfaces I know other people will touch too, I should make sure my hands are clean so I don’t pass on the germs on my hands to other hands. Those germs may not be dangerous to me, but they could seriously harm someone who is immunocompromised or has an underlying medical condition.
This is especially important as we all go through this pandemic. According to the WHO, COVID-19, like other viruses, can live on surfaces for as long as several days. Anytime you touch a commonly-touched surface, be mindful of this. You never know who has touched that surface and who will touch that surface. A person may be infected without knowing it, and if they do not wash their hands, they may infect the surfaces they touch. If an elderly person or someone who is at risk during COVID-19 then touches that surface, they may become infected too. That original infected person may recover, but what happens to that elderly person, or that immunocompromised person?
It is extremely important that we think about where the germs we transmit from our hands to surfaces may end up. Even if you may not be seriously at risk because of COVID-19, there are others around you who may, and you should respect their needs as well as your own. There is no way to completely stop transmitting germs to surfaces, but you can limit what you do transmit by washing your hands as much as possible. During this time of uncertainty, handwashing is the one thing that is certain: if everyone washes their hands according to CDC and WHO guidelines, we can make a big difference and help to significantly mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
Visit https://www.who.int/gpsc/clean_hands_protection/en/ for more information on proper handwashing.
1 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/health/soap-coronavirus-handwashing-germs.html