Good hygiene practices can teach your child to keep infections at bay. © Shutterstock
The best way to reduce the spread of infections and various kinds of diseases in children is by teaching them to abide by good hygiene practices and stay away from germs. The best way to do this is by inculcating a good routine of hand-washing, which should be done often to get rid of the microbes that take refuge in the little hands while they are at play or home touching contaminated surfaces, using the toilet, playing with pets, etc. Another way to limit the spread of infections is to get a vaccine for those infections and viruses that have one, when available. However, the best way to limit infection spread is still the trivial one washing hands with a mild soap and water.
Here are some simple ways or good hygiene practices that you can teach your child to keep infections at bay:
Teach them to wash hands frequently: It is a no-brainer but needs to be practised strictly. In fact, hand-washing can prevent about 30 per cent of diarrhoea-related sicknesses. Some of these infections could be a bacterial infection too. Instruct them to wash hands after coughing, sneezing or using tissues too.
Keep your child at home if he/she is sick: As a parent doesn't just calculate how many days worth of sick leave your child is going to take. Instead, worry about what you can do to help him heal faster. To speed the healing process, first, don't allow your child to go to school or play if your child is sick. This will make sure that your child is not spreading the germs to others and is resting enough to get back in shape. With sickness, a child's immunity is already low if you allow the little one to go out this could further hamper his immunity and worsen the infection.
Teach your child how to sneeze the right way: Tell your child to use a tissue, or a cough and sneeze into your arm, not the hand and to turn away from other people. This will limit infection spread. Tell him, to use tissues just once and dispose of it immediately. Reusing tissues can make infections linger for long. Also, tell them not to touch the eyes, nose or mouth after sneezing as viruses can transfer from your hands and into the body.
Let them play with toys that limit infection spread: By this we mean get toys that hare made of hard surfaces that can be easily cleaned. Soft toys could be a storehouse of microbes and bacteria.
Tell them sharing is not caring all the time: Tell your child that sharing cups, glasses and cutlery can lead to infection as they can spread germs.
