While most of us have recently become more diligent about washing our hands - and washing them properly - the soap-and-20-seconds rule is nothing new for Timothy Caulfield, professor of Law and Public Health.
"I'm already a bit of a germophobe, though I'm definitely taking things up a notch during the pandemic," Caulfield says. His pre-pandemic hand washing tendencies inspired him to dig into the history and value of hand washing for a chapter in his forthcoming book: Relax Dammit! A User's Guide to the Age of Anxiety (out December 1).
According to Caulfield, for most of human history people didn't think about washing their hands at all. The Babylonians have been credited with inventing soap in 2800 BC, but it wasn't used for personal hygiene and disease prevention. It wasn't until Germ Theory was developed in the mid-1800s that people began to understand that diseases are caused by the presence of microorganisms known as germs. Emerging evidence then determined that hand washing could remove germs and help prevent some diseases. Early studies in hospitals showed that patients with caregivers who washed their hands had fewer infections than those with caregivers who didn't. Today hand washing is enforced in many environments (such as hospitals and kitchens), though Caulfield's research shows that it hasn't been top of mind for average people during their day-to-day lives.
Timothy Caulfield
"The data shows that only five percent of people wash their hands appropriately," Caulfield says. "More people wash their hands, but only five percent do it well. Over the past couple months we've heard so much about how to wash your hands properly, but when I wrote the book that messaging wasn't out in the public sphere as much. Use soap and water for 20 seconds - that matters. Hand washing is the most valuable thing you can do in the fight against pathogenic germs."
Ok, so you should wash your hands - but should you direct a hair dryer up your nose to prevent COVID-19?
That's just one of the pseudoscience techniques recently touted to prevent or cure COVID-19 - others include everything from whiskey and cow urine to cocaine and bleach, Caulfield says. Still other misinformation re-frames existing products, like supplements and cleanses, as ways of boosting immunity to COVID-19. "The concept of boosting the immune system is not true at all," Caulfield explains, "but when you look up Google trends for immune boosting, searches have gone through the roof. If you search Google or Instagram for immune boosting, you're led to a whole bunch of nonsense. As preliminary work for a study I looked at 100 Instagram posts on immune boosting and not a single one had scientifically accurate information." Caulfield insists that simple, low-tech soap is the best way to prevent COVID-19 - and there's no need to scour drugstore aisles for the best variety. "Using basic soap is fine," Caulfield says. "A more expensive product is not necessarily better. Basic ingredients are all you need."
The unproven COVID-19 therapies are still largely circulated by celebrities and influencers. "Pop culture has framed for so long how we think about health and wellness," Caulfield says. "A study came out of Oxford last week that showed that while common figures (politicians, celebrities, influencers) are only creating about 20 percent of the noise around COVID-19, that information accounts for about 70 percent of what is shared on social media. So even though they're not taking up as much cultural space, they're still having a big impact on public discourse around this health issue."
Caulfield expects that the pandemic may change our attitudes toward hand washing significantly over the long term. He's less confident about attitudes toward unproven therapies. "I hope that one of the legacies of this virus will be appreciation for the harm that these pseudosciences can have on society," Caulfield says. "I hope there's a growing recognition of how ludicrous some of the things celebrities offer are."