How Washing Your Hands Can Protect Your Health

Washing your hands is the best way to reduce the spread of infectious diseases, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It sounds simple and easy, but the truth is that only about 5 percent of people wash their hands properly after using the restroom.

Properly means washing hands long enough and with soap to make them clean enough to ward off spread of disease. Take a look at these alarming results from a recent study about hand washing.

• 10 percent overall do not wash their hands at all
• 15 percent of men and 7 percent of women do not wash their hands
• 50 percent of men used soap when washing their hands compared to 78 percent among women
• Most people only spend 6 seconds washing their hands

The proper way to wash hands

The Centers for Disease Control urges people to spend 15-20 seconds washing their hands vigorously with soap. Anything less will not kill bacteria and will increase the risk of contracting infectious diseases. In fact, not washing your hands properly is the cause of nearly 50 percent of all foodborne illness outbreaks and contamination from fecal matter.

So, keep it clean and stay healthy. WASH YOUR HANDS!