Who knew that when we began a "handwashing" campaign at The Next Stop in January, the world would soon be facing a corona virus health crisis?! Our campaign was a lesson on WHY we wash hands and HOW to do it correctly.

To reinforce the "why", several very visual techniques were used. A little flour (germs in our discussion) was put on a ball....then passed around. Yes, there was flour left on many hands and clothes. Yikes, the spreading was obvious.

The most effective visual proof of where germs lie (hot spots), was seen on the Bread Experiment. The first week, clean slices of bread were used to rub on potential hot spots. There was also a slice of bread used as the control, one rubbed on washed hands and one was rubbed on hand sanitizer lathered hands. All were bagged, labeled and then displayed.

In one week, germ growth began on most of the hot spot pieces--but never the control, handwashed or hand sanitizer pieces. In two weeks, it was very evident that the hot spots that had the most germs are items that are touched by many like door handles, sink faucets, money, etc. The non-washed hand piece of bread showed us WHY we should wash our hands!

The display of bread was not photographed after this, but we kept for 4 weeks. The control, handwashed and hand sanitized hand bread remained germ free! The rest continued to turn black....except the money which turned a variety of colors.

Lesson learned. :-)