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Did you know?

Facts about hand hygiene and washing hands

  • Sickness absence costs employers £495 a year in direct costs for every worker employed. Indirect costs are probably considerably more (CBI 2005 statistics)
  • Norovirus – a common form of sickness and diarrhoea can result in individuals being off work for up to four days
  • Handwashing is the best way to avoid colds, flu and other viruses (Professor John Oxford, of London's Queen Mary's School of Medicine, and various others)
  • Up to half of all men and a quarter of women fail to wash their hands after they've been to the toilet
  • We have between 2 and 10 million bacteria between fingertip and elbow
  • The number of germs on your fingertips doubles after you use the toilet
  • Germs can stay alive on hands for up to three hours