Essity has teamed up with the Global Handwashing Partnership (GHP), an organisation that aims to bring hand hygiene within everyone’s reach.
Essity has become a strategic partner of the GHP, whose prestigious steering committee members include UNICEF and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Essity, which makes Tork hygiene products, has been a member of the GHP since 2017 and is one of a select few organisations to have been offered a strategic partnership.
Magnus Groth, Essity’s CEO and President, commented: “The Global Handwashing Partnership brings together the expertise, experience, ideas, resources, and reach of both the public and private sectors all over the world to promote handwashing with soap.
“Hand hygiene is essential for our wellbeing – and in the midst of an ongoing pandemic we need to do more to increase our hygiene practices both now and in the future. As one of the world’s leading hygiene companies and manufacturer of Tork soaps and hand towels, we feel uniquely placed to team up with GHP to promote hand hygiene.”
Established in 2001, the GHP organises the annual Global Handwashing Day which takes place on 15 October. Local and national leaders use the occasion to demonstrate the value of clean hands, spreading the handwashing message and supporting communities with facilities such as sinks and tippy taps.
Global Handwashing Day, founded in 2008, also encourages groups and individuals to devise creative new ways of encouraging people to wash their hands with soap and water at critical times, such as after using the toilet and before coming into contact with food.
Handwashing with soap can dramatically reduce the risk of diarrhoea and pneumonia which can cause serious illness and death, according to the GHP. Good hand hygiene can also help to prevent the spread of other infections including influenza and Ebola.
The aim of the GHP’s ‘Hand Hygiene for All’ initiative – co-led by the WHO and UNICEF – is to ensure that hand hygiene products and services are made available to everyone, particularly those in disadvantaged countries.
GHP’s Secretariat Director, Ron Clemmer, said: “We want hand hygiene to become normalised and habitual, thus achieving the vision of hand hygiene for all by 2030. Essity is an important partner with us in this initiative, sharing the company’s thought leadership to support hand hygiene in schools and work environments.”
