Global Handwashing Day

Global Handwashing Day

The practice of handwashing with soap tops the international hygiene agenda this year with the first-ever Global Handwashing Day, which will take place on Wednesday, 15 October 2008. The UN General Assembly has designated 2008 the International Year of Sanitation, and Global Handwashing Day will echo and reinforce its call for improved hygiene practices.

The guiding vision of Global Handwashing Day is a local and global culture of handwashing with soap. Although people around the world wash their hands with water, very few wash their hands with soap at critical moments (for example, after using the toilet, while cleaning a child, and before handling food).

The challenge is to transform handwashing with soap from an abstract good idea into an automatic behaviour performed in homes, schools, and communities worldwide. Turning handwashing with soap before eating and after using the toilet into an ingrained habit could save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention, cutting deaths from diarrhoea by almost half and deaths from acute respiratory infections by one-quarter. Handwashing with soap would make a significant contribution to meeting the Millennium Development Goal of reducing deaths among children under the age of five by two-thirds by 2015.

Launched by the Public-Private Partnership for Handwashing with Soap (PPPHW), this first-ever event – with Lifebuoy one of the main instigators - is designed to:

• Introduce the idea of a Global Handwashing Day and begin the process of yearly commemoration

• Shine a spotlight on the state of handwashing in each country

• Raise awareness about the benefits of handwashing with soap

The inaugural Global Handwashing Day will revolve around schools and children. Children suffer disproportionately from diarrhoeal and respiratory diseases and deaths. But research shows that children – the segment of society so often the most energetic, enthusiastic and open to new ideas – can also be part of the solution. Ideally situated at the intersection of the home, school and community, children can be powerful agents of behavioural change.

During Global Handwashing Day – and the surrounding week – playgrounds, classrooms, community centres and the public spaces of towns and cities will be awash with educational and awareness-raising activity as countries unite to change handwashing behaviour on a scale never seen before.

About the Lifebuoy brand

Lifebuoy has championed a message of health through hygiene consistently through a history that stretches back over 110 years. This message is more important than ever in many developing countries, where millions of lives can be saved simply by hand washing.

Lifebuoy is one of Unilever's oldest brands; launched in the UK in 1894 as the first affordable soap, supporting people in their quest for better personal hygiene. Today, Lifebuoy is mainly sold in Asia and parts of Africa – in fact, it is the market leader in every Asian market where it is sold. Nearly half of Lifebuoy brand's consumption is in rural Asia, where most of the population live on less than US$1 per day and hygiene issues like hand washing are vital to the health of the population.

Why is Lifebuoy involved in Global Handwashing Day?

Lifebuoy's vision is to make five billion people in the world feel safer and more secure by meeting fundamental health and hygiene needs. Partnerships play a central role in delivering this vision. Working in the PPPHW, with organisations like the World Bank and UNICEF, helps Lifebuoy change the behaviour of billions of consumers through joint initiatives promoting handwashing with soap.

For Lifebuoy, the partnership activities go to the very heart of the brand's ambitions and are, in every sense, vitality in action. These programmes bring benefits to everyone involved: they support the brand's growth plans, enable Lifebuoy's partners to achieve their public health goals, and help people throughout the developing world to live with greater freedom from health problems.