The benefits of personal hygiene can not be overemphasized. Every individual needs to keep themselves as clean as possible as keeping the body clean is essential for a good social life. People who do not have a sense of cleanliness often have challenges of mingling with other people as they often find them not worthy of any association, this is why it is imperative to ensure that one has a good sense of personal hygiene.
There are several benefits of personal hygiene that one should not overlook, no matter what.
Good personal hygiene involves keeping all parts of the external body clean and healthy.
It is important for maintaining both physical and mental health.
In people with poor personal hygiene, the body provides an ideal environment for germs to grow, leaving them vulnerable to infection.
Types of personal hygiene
There are several forms of personal hygiene that essentially talk about keeping yourself clean. Any part of your body that inhibits smell, needs taking care of to avoid anything that would lead to decision and discrimination by others as no one want to associate with anyone that has some level of body odour on them.
Some of the types of personal hygiene include taking care of the teeth. A good dental hygiene routine can help prevent issues such as gum disease and cavities. It can also prevent bad breath.
Another type is care for the body. Several million sweat glands cover the human body.
When bacteria break down the sweat, the process creates a smell or body odor.
Washing the body will help prevent skin irritation, as well as remove the bacteria that cause body odor.
Washing the hair removes oil and keeps a person looking clean and fresh.
Hand washing is another form of personal hygiene. Regular hand washing is one of the best ways to avoid spreading communicable diseases.
Recommended times for washing hands
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)Trusted Source recommend washing the hands at certain times:
- before, during, and after preparing food
- before eating food
- before and after looking after anyone who is vomiting or has diarrhea
- before and after treating a cut or wound
- after going to the bathroom
- after changing diapers or cleaning up a child who has used the toilet
- after blowing the nose, coughing, or sneezing
- after touching garbage or dirty surfaces or objects
- after handling pets or pet-related items, such as food
Taking care of the toe and fingernails is another form of personal hygiene that people need to practice.
Many people leave their fingernails to grow in a manner that would provide and haven for diseases to attack the person, as such, taking care of the nails by regularly cutting them would help prevent these diseases.
It is easier for dirt and germs to collect under longer nails, so keeping them short can help reduce the risk of spreading infections.
Menstrual and genital hygiene is as important as the other forms of personal hygiene identified above.
It is important to change sanitary products regularly and to wash the hands before and after changing tampons, pads, or any other sanitary products.
As vaginas are self-cleaning, using soap to clean the vagina can cause an imbalance of its natural bacteria and lead to infections.
The vulva (the external part of the vagina) should only need cleaning once a day using mild soap and water.
People with an uncircumcised penis can clean it by gently pulling back the foreskin and washing underneath it with warm water or soap.
Benefits of personal hygiene
After we have done all of these things, what are the benefits of personal hygiene that we can enjoy.
I believe you are well aware of the benefits of personal hygiene.
In this article, we try to see some of the benefits that personal hygiene could bring to us for which reason we have to strive to achieve personal hygiene as a matter of necessity.
Some benefits of personal hygiene to us include, but are not limited to the following:
Personal Hygiene frees us of germs and diseases.
When we keep ourselves clean and observe all the forms of personal hygiene listed above, we wouldn’t have to worry about diseases affecting us as we do not provide any haven for these germs to multiply and give us various diseases.
Personal hygiene keep our body clean
When we observe personal hygiene, it ensures that our bodies are kept clean at all times. When we wash our hands constantly, brush our teeth, cut our fingers and toenail and trim our hair nicely, we look clean and neat.
With personal hygiene, the body increases its germ-killing capacity
Good personal hygiene also means eating good food and in the right amounts, when we do this, our immune systems become stronger to fight against any diseases that attack us. These are all benefits of personal hygiene to us.
Other important benefits of personal hygiene include:
- Personal hygiene is important as it prevents many harmful diseases.
- Good hygiene habits help us to keep our bodies strong and healthy.
- It also helps us to give a good appearance.
- It helped us have better self-esteem. so when we take care of ourselves we feel better about ourselves.
- The implementation of personal hygiene habits not only prevents us from in less but also provides added personal and social benefits.
The benefits of personal hygiene are so many, you can probably add to the list we have provided here for you but the catch is if you don’t practice personal hygiene, these benefits of personal hygiene are not things that you are going to enjoy.
Every good thing comes with a price to pay and if you desire these benefits of personal hygiene, you just need to try and keep yourself clean at all times.
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Video credit: CNN Philippines.
Source: GhBase.com