The United Nations Children’s’ Fund (UNICEF) with support from the Ghana Education Service, has organised a workshop on “tippy tap” campaign in Ho in the Volta Region to promote regular hand washing for the general well-being of citizens.
The “tippy tap” is a simple economical hand washing station that can be made from commonly available materials such as Y-shaped sticks, water container, soap and rope among others, which are utilised mostly in rural areas.
Ms Marcia Halm, the Consultant for the Project, said the initiative was to help reduce the burden of Water Sanitation Health (WASH) related-diseases among school children in the Region.
The project, which has a year’s life span, would be implemented in the 25 districts of the Region, targeting all public schools with a population of about a million.
Mr Constant Dzakpasu, the Volta Regional School Health Programme (SHEP) Coordinator, said: “Hand washing is the single-most cost-effective health intervention available across the globe today, at a cost of just $3.35 per DAY-averted”.
He said hand washing with soap had the ability of reducing the prevalence of diarrhoeal diseases by 40 per cent, neonatal mortality by 44 per cent and school absenteeism by 54 per cent.
Mr Dzakpasu explained that the five key times advocated by UNICEF for hand washing was after defecation, handling a child’s faeces, before preparing food, feeding a child and before eating.
Madam Patricia Baku of the Ghana Health Service said: “While we want people to wash their hands with soap in order to prevent illnesses and death, health education has failed to change the hand washing with soap behaviour in Ghana”.
She said to achieve hand washing with soap, there was the need to focus on triggering a disgusting response by telling people to “avoid eating shit.”
This year’s Global Hand Washing Day, which falls on 15th October, and coincides with the “Tippy Tap” Campaign, is themed: “Make Handwashing a Habit”.
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Source: GNA