Kenney Paul Lawer, Agboh Herman Nuake Kofi, Agyemang Florence Akosua, Dadzie Seth Sylvester, Duah Henry Ofori, Agbadi Pascal
Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research, University of Ghana, P.O. Box LG74, Legon-Accra, Ghana.
Department of Social Work, University of Ghana, P.O. Box LG 419, Ghana.
Heliyon. 2020 Aug 9;6(8):e04684. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2020.e04684. eCollection 2020 Aug.
Handwashing with soap and water remains the most effective public health measure to reduce the risk of infectious diseases, which kill over 2.5 million people annually, mostly children in developing countries. The absence of hand hygiene resources in homes put many at risk of these infectious diseases. In the wake of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) and governments around the world have stressed the importance of regular handwashing to prevent the spread of the virus. This suggests that research on water, sanitation, and hygiene issues deserve continuous scholarly attention. In Ghana, studies on household's access to hand hygiene resources are few and relatively old. Therefore, this study estimated the proportion of Ghanaian households with access to hand hygiene resources and their associated determinants using data from a recent national survey.
The study used the cross-sectional 2014 Ghana Demographic and Health Surveys dataset. We used STATA-14 to perform data analyses on a weighted sample of 11,710.06 households. We used complex samples analysis technique to adjust for sample units, stratification and sample weights for both the descriptive statistics and multivariate robust Poisson regression.
The result showed that about one fifth of Ghanaian households had access to hand hygiene resources. Households with heads who attained a Middle/JHS/JSS or Secondary/SSS/SHS/Higher level education, those headed by persons having at least 30-44 years, and non-poorest households, and from the Volta region were more likely to have access to hand hygiene resources. Further, households in urban areas, households that spent between 0-30 min to get to a source of water, and households in Eastern and Brong-Ahafo regions were less likely to have access to hand hygiene resources.
This study identified key socioeconomic and demographic correlates of a household's access to hand hygiene resources in Ghana. In the interim, the government and development partners can provide hand hygiene resources to households with limited or no access. For the long term, we recommend that the government should implement measures and policies that facilitate citizens' economic independence and their attainment of higher formal education.
用肥皂和水洗手仍然是降低传染病风险最有效的公共卫生措施，传染病每年导致超过250万人死亡，其中大多数是发展中国家的儿童。家庭中缺乏手部卫生资源使许多人面临这些传染病的风险。在新冠疫情爆发后，世界卫生组织（WHO）和世界各国政府都强调了定期洗手对防止病毒传播的重要性。这表明对水、环境卫生和个人卫生问题的研究值得学术界持续关注。在加纳，关于家庭获得手部卫生资源的研究很少且相对陈旧。因此，本研究利用最近一次全国调查的数据，估计了加纳有机会获得手部卫生资源的家庭比例及其相关决定因素。
本研究使用了2014年加纳人口与健康调查的横断面数据集。我们使用STATA - 14对11710.06户加权样本进行数据分析。我们使用复杂样本分析技术对样本单位、分层和样本权重进行调整，以进行描述性统计和多元稳健泊松回归。
结果显示，约五分之一的加纳家庭能够获得手部卫生资源。户主接受过初中/初中/初中或高中/高中/高中/高等教育的家庭、户主年龄在至少30 - 44岁的家庭、非最贫困家庭以及来自沃尔特地区的家庭更有可能获得手部卫生资源。此外，城市地区的家庭、取水时间在0 - 30分钟之间的家庭以及东部和布朗阿哈福地区的家庭获得手部卫生资源的可能性较小。
本研究确定了加纳家庭获得手部卫生资源的关键社会经济和人口统计学相关因素。在此期间，政府和发展伙伴可以向获得资源有限或无法获得资源的家庭提供手部卫生资源。从长远来看，我们建议政府应实施有助于公民经济独立和获得更高正规教育的措施和政策。
