15/10/08; See: http://www.postcourier.com.pg/20081015/wehome.htm
Today is the first Global Handwashing Day to be celebrated in 70 countries. It is aimed at mobilising and motivating millions around the world to wash their hands with soap. While many people in PNG, especially children may not see the importance, hand washing with soap is one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to prevent diseases, including diarrhoea and pneumonia, which together are responsible for about 3.5 million child deaths every year. In PNG, the situation is no different. These two diseases rate among the top 10 killer diseases in the country.
According to statistics released recently by the president of the PNG Medical Society Dr Mathias Sapuri, about 4500 per 100,000 children die of pneumonia every day in PNG, second to malaria which kills 8000 people a day. The death rate of young children is high in PNG and attempts by families, communities and even teachers at school to teach the habit of handwashing with soap after the use of toilets, work and play will go a long way towards protecting children from unnecessary sicknesses and deaths. It is also said that washing with soap helps reduce child morbity rates from diarrhoeal diseases by almost 50 per cent.
The UN General Assembly declared 2008 the International Year of Sanitation (IYS). Global Handwashing Day reinforces the IYS’s call for improved sanitation and hygiene practices.
More than 5000 children under five die every day as a result of diarrhoeal diseases, caused in part by unsafe water, lack of access to basic sanitation facilities and poor hygiene. To achieve this reduction and for large scale, community-sensitive, and sustainable change to occur, partnerships with national and local governments, international organisations, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), religious and community leaders, schools and the private sector are essential.