HOME HEALTH GUIDE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 October 1943, Page 5

HOME HEALTH GUIDE

THAT PECK OF DIRT NEED FOR CLEANLINESS (By the Department of Health) How many of us have heard the ageold injunction about having to eat a peck of dirt before we die, and wondered in what insanitary legend it had its roots? We have grown a little particular about that sort of thing these days, and this attitude definitely marks one of the most important of civilisation’s advances —appreciation of cleanliness. No matter where it applies, cleanliness is one of the most powerful factors in the prevention of disease. Moreover, it is not difficult to be clean, and people have no excuse for not keeping iheir own bodies clean. Some people, however, do seem to overlook the importance of cleanliness. A piece of china, or a garment, if washed and put away, will keep, clean as long as it is covered. But the human body, however well washed it may be one day, must be washed again the next if it is to remain clean. That is because the skin is constantly giving off both grease and moisture. The process goes on all the time, even when we are at rest. That grease keeps the skin supple, that moisture we know as perspiration, and the pores through which these exude must be kept open. The unwashed skin is, in effect, a source of dangerous dirt —a combination of grease and moisture —the sort of dirt that holds and carries and propagates the germs of disease that float in the air. A scratch or a cut on a dirty hand might easily lead to bloodpoisoning. Keep the skin clean. Lei everything in the house be spotless and let light and air into your rooms. In this way health is best maintained and chills and infections warded off.