OPINION AND OPTION
By ELINANDO B. CINCO
Elinando B. Cinco
During our juvenile years, two of the favorite off-meal candies of kids were the butterball lollipops and the thumb-size chocolate bars. Parents had a peace of mind buying them for their children, because more than the fact that the imported confectionaries were not only delicious, they came with the reassuring line – “Untouched by human hands.”
I asked by mother, who was a public school teacher, what the phrase meant. She answered, “They were clean when made and wrapped when delivered to stores for sale.”
Today, I guess, that was what she could say about the robotics assembly line in the manufacture of consumer goods. No factory worker touches with his bare hands the products while they are being made.
In the current war against the scourge of coronavirus, we note that the hands are the busiest part of the human body. But the human hands are now feared as one of the carriers of the disease.
Thus the government and NGOs keep telling the public to always wash hands thoroughly.
There is soap, ethyl alcohol (at least, 70 percent), and other sanitizing products to help us do the cleaning of our hands.
Do the cleaning thoroughly – from the palm and back of the hand, to the deepest crevices of the fingernails, to the spaces between the fingers.
When do we do it?
Immediately upon reaching your place of work. And while you are on your way, avoid touching your mouth, nose, eyes, and ears. They are the most convenient entry venues of the disease. Follow the same procedure when going home.
Be mindful that our innocent-looking hands can carry the virus when we turn door knobs, handle money bills, receive letters and envelops, use the telephone, give a handshake, and make “beso-beso.”
So, help beat the virus and enlist the help of the anti-COVID-19 arsenal within your reach.
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Last weekend, I heard over a local AM radio station a taped announcement from an overseas broadcast network that the word “CORONAVIRUS” is now being mentioned 17 million times every minute
by people in 170 countries all over the world.
If that word were a marketing tool, it may have already outpaced by 100 times the commercial and name-recall value of all existing brands and trademarks of corporations combined worldwide.