Healing Waters International establishes and installs clean water solutions for developing nations and impoverished communities everywhere, but we don’t stop there. For continued success, we empower the communities with critical health and hygiene training to eliminate the spread of water-born illnesses. Once this happens, communities see an immediate positive impact, because good hygiene results in a healthy, productive population. Ready to watch a community grow before your eyes? It all starts with learning the importance of water sanitation and hygiene practices.
Why Developing Communities Need Good Hygiene
Many issues present in developing communities today begin with water, or rather, a lack of access to clean, safe water. Water sanitation and hygiene training are the keys to helping these communities grow. Besides the obvious means of survival, clean water can also help with the following issues.
Productivity: In developing countries, individuals spend a lot of time searching for and clean water, especially children and young adults. This is something children in developed nations don’t even have to think about. If the time spent gathering water is eliminated, then children in these communities can return to school, or otherwise use their time much more productively.
Poverty: Illness creates an unfortunate cycle. A sick person needs to stay home to prevent the spread of disease. As a result, the sick person will miss opportunities to work, go to school, or other means of being productive. Now another healthy person needs to look after the sick person, causing them to miss out on the same events. This doesn’t even include the money needed to buy medicine for the sick person instead of being used for other essentials.
Health: Containing the spread of disease by cleaning up the water supply and practicing good hygiene means fewer sick people. By reducing time spent sick, the lost time can be allocated towards more important things, and eventually, growth.
Hunger: Disease isn’t the only issue caused by lack of safe water. Easy access to a large enough clean water supply means fewer crop and food shortages, meaning fewer hungry people.
6 Steps We Teach In Our Health & Hygiene Program in Developing Countries
At the end of the day, proper handwashing is your best defense against spreading illness and disease. Routine handwashing with the right technique is important to maintain, easy to do, and can save millions of lives every year. This is why we always go over six simple steps of effective handwashing to developing communities across the world as part of our health and hygiene program.
1. Wet hands with clean, safe water
2. Add soap and lather to make bubbles
3. Rub your hands together briskly for at least 20 seconds
4. Wash between your fingers, the back of your hands, and scrub under your nails
5. Rinse well with clean water over your hands
6. Dry your hands, or simply shake them in the air to dry
The Children’s Curriculum
To instill great habits for years to come, it’s vital to teach children methods to stay healthy and clean at an early age. In these developing years, children are also the most vulnerable to illness since their immune systems are experiencing everything for the first time. Without awareness of how germs spread disease, children can often be the biggest source of transference. With our Health and Hygiene training, children participate in six fun and interactive lessons. These lessons cover important topics such as proper handwashing, personal hygiene, nutrition, how germs are spread, and the importance of drinking clean water.
Growth of the body and mind is so delicate at this time in a person’s life. Children are particularly susceptible to water-related illnesses. A reliable clean water source reduces diseases caused by bacteria in water, leading to healthier, more focused children. Eventually, children will lead the charge, so teaching these valuable lessons at such an impressionable age will ensure they will go on to teach future generations the same habits and so on.
The Women’s Curriculum
Women will always be highly influential members of any community or any family. If women are taught the essentials for good health and hygiene practices, then they can share what they learn from our program to spread awareness more effectively. Needless to say, getting our message across starts with the women of the community. As women are such an important part of the family, learning how to protect themselves and their families from disease is valuable to allow any community to thrive.
Our curriculum involves leading six small, intimate discussions and lessons facilitated by a local trained by our Health and Hygiene Staff. Our lessons teach women about how germs cause disease, how water gets contaminated with germs, and how to eliminate the spread of disease with good hygiene. Beyond physical health training, we allow for the chance for emotional and spiritual development to offer compassion, a main goal of our training. We hope to give women a safe place to communicate about the issues that affect their daily lives.
Handwashing Saves Lives
Men, women, and children who are made aware of the importance of handwashing all play important roles in saving lives. Millions of lives can be saved every year if everyone plays a part. This is why we attempt to reach as many members of the community as possible, so Healing Waters can always use your help.
Through our training, adults and children alike receive valuable lessons on handwashing and nutrition and learn the importance of clean drinking water for all. It is our privilege to aid these communities through compassion and dignity. After all, we should all be concerned about clean water, it’s a battle for all of us. Contact us to learn more about our health and hygiene training and how you can help us reach more people. Together we can make sure we all have safe water.