The Environmental Health and Sanitation Office of the Krachi East Assembly of the Oti Region has marked this year’s Global Hand Washing Day with residents of Tamanja in the Municipality.
The programme, organised in collaboration with Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA), was to increase awareness of the importance of hand washing with soap under running water.
The United Nations set aside October 15, annually, to observe the Day as part of efforts to attain clean hand washing as a daily habit.
This year’s theme: “Unite for Universal Hand Hygiene,” calls on society to work together to scale up the vision for universal access and practice of hand hygiene.
Mr Richard Kofi Hadzi, the Municipal Director, CWSA, said the consumption of unsafe drinking water and inadequate sanitary conditions contributed to diseases and increased the rate of typhoid fever in the communities.
He, therefore, urged the community members to boil their water before drinking to prevent typhoid fever and diarrhoea.
Madam Sybil Marie Boison, the Oti Regional Environmental Health Officer, urged the residents to continue to observe good hygiene and sanitation, including regular hand washing.
She said frequent hand washing was one of the key protocols prescribed by experts in the fight against typhoid fever.
She again said good hygiene promotes good health and asked the citizens to wash their hands with soap after using the toilet and before handling food.
Madam Boison encouraged all and sundry to make washing hands with soap under running water a regular habit, given the significant part, it played in preventing diseases.
Obor Tamanja Uje, the Traditional Overlord of the area, expressed appreciation to the environmental health officers and the CWSA for the sensitisation on the health benefits of handwashing.
Source: GNA