Did you see this article--Rules to Protect allergic student upset some in Placer--about a school making accommodations for a child with food allergies? One of the accommodations was that the child's classmates would wash their hands when necessary and now some of the children have developed dry, cracked skin and sores on their hands! Something just doesn't sound right about this. My initial reaction was focused on the attempt to accommodate by an easy effort--hand washing--but...sores from hand washing? What in the world is in that soap?!
My son's preschool has the children wash their hands upon entering the classroom and before eating snack, helpful for the food allergic child, but it's also just good hygiene. You know how germ filled those younger grades are. How could anyone be opposed to hand washing? But I must ask again--what in the world is in that soap? Just for the record, it doesn't need to be heavy duty soap or even anti-bacterial to remove germs and allergens. It just needs to be plain old soap, and using it can make all the difference in the world...
Thanks to the school for trying to protect that food allergic child. Now let's try to get a milder soap in there and maybe lower that water temperature a smidge!
8 comments:
Something is up with the soap or, their washing too long.
My skin gets dry in winter, I put a little over counter cream on every few days. My skin used to get dry when diaper changing / hand washing again a litttle lotion every other day, not a problem.
Hey Karen, thanks for your comment! I thought the same thing. What kind of soap is that?!
The students in my son's classroom wash hands before and after lunch and snack. I haven't heard anything about sores and cracked skin.
Good for that school principal to support the health needs of the children in the school. I hope they can work out a management plan that works for everyone.
I saw this and I think its terrible that someone would complain about cracked and dry hands over someones life being cared for. As I type this I look at my terribly dry hands and think, so, at least I'm clean.
"before the school day starts as part of the children's morning routine, after snack or lunch time and as needed after bathroom breaks or messy lessons"
The above routine is a standard in my son's daycare. It should be no different anywhere else.
Gimme a break--now somebody's complaining because kids are being asked to wash their hands???? The 3rd graders in my daughter's class are given hand-wipes before and after eating and I think they are asked to wash hands somewhere during the course of the day. I've never heard one complaint about "sore hands." That story kind of smells like food allergy backlash to me. I was LOL at your comments about the soap! Was it industrial strength or what?
On a side note--Jennifer, what ever happened with the Greek Easter bread you asked me about? Let me know! :)--Jenny
Our school does the handwashing thing too. It's great! No peanut residue, no germs. Maybe a well-place bottle of lotion would do the trick. Doesn't seem like a very difficult problem to solve.
Thanks everyone for commenting! I know, my impolite gut reaction was--are they kidding me? Sores on the hands? But, I am an open-minded person...maybe they thought they need to wash with bleach...? Oops. Sorry! Hee hee. Seriously, ordinary hand-washing is what we all get after our kids to do, right? It doesn't cause sores unless there's something wrong with soap or water!
In our experience, our kids teachers always came back at the end of the year and consistently commented on how few sick children they had in the class once they instituted hand-washing.
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