Africa-Press – Botswana. Hand hygiene is pivotal in maintaining clean and safe healthcare provision.
Rare Craft Empire managing director, Mr Mbako Buzwani, said during the International Hand Hygiene Day commemoration in Gaborone recently.
Mr Buzwani said the event was an opportunity to reflect on hand hygiene, adding that research had shown that hand hygiene saved millions of lives every year when performed at the right times during healthcare delivery.
He said the Clean Your Hands campaign was part of a global effort to motivate healthcare workers to improve hand hygiene, something that would help in prevention of hospital acquired infections (HAI).
“The aim of the global campaign is to bring people together in support of hand hygiene in healthcare improvement and thus impact positively on the quality of care and patient safety across all levels of the health system,” Mr Buzwani said.
He said the day commemorated under the slogan; Accelerate Action Together, was focused on the idea that all could accelerate action to prevent infections and antimicrobial resistance in healthcare as well as build a culture of safety and quality in which hand hygiene improvement was given a high priority.
He indicated that clean care was a sign of respect to those who needed care and it protected healthcare workers and others who provided such care.
“It is critical that countries accelerate implementation of lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic and increase investments to close gaps in infection, prevention and control (IPC), including hand hygiene, adding that the more countries lax on repeatedly hand-washing, gains were at risk,” he added.
Furthermore, he said a report from WHO showed that where good hand hygiene and other cost-effective practices were followed, 70 per cent of those infections could be prevented.
“The impact of healthcare associated infections and antimicrobial resistance on people’s lives is incalculable,” he said, adding that over 24 per cent of patients affected by healthcare associated sepsis and 52.3 per cent of those patients treated in an intensive care unit died each year.
Mr Buzwani, therefore, reminded all to take time to wash hands for 20 seconds during key times to stay healthy, saying it was a good hand hygiene regimen that could protect all people.
He said the campaign had since been extended to all outside the health sector as cleanliness of hands was important.
Botswana joined the rest of the world to commemorate the day as part of a major global effort to improve hand hygiene in healthcare.
The International Hand Hygiene Day commemoration was led by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to support healthcare workers. Ends
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