After spending some time reading over different resources touching on hygiene, I find it more easy to see how developing nations are in such a struggle to survive bacterial diseases… and have been for a very long time.

Even our developed nations have small percentages of their populations that still have difficulty in being prepared to battle for their health due to bad hygiene practices.  We have the knowledge to make good practice of all the correct hygienic methods… most of us were trained from a young age to maintain these procedures everyday.  It can almost be outside of our realm of thinking to understand why the entire world are not aware of these things, but these are the facts.

The remaining text has been pulled directly from the International Scientific Forum on Home Hygiene:  Resource

Why is home hygiene important?

In the past 20 years or so, infectious disease has moved steadily back up the health agenda, prompting new emphasis on developing strategies for prevention and control. Increasingly this includes promotion of hygiene to the family, both at home and in their social and work lives outside the home. Infectious disease is a significant cause of ill health world-wide, accounting for over 13 million deaths every year. Although the majority of deaths occur in the developing world, infectious disease still causes around 4% of deaths in developed countries and is a significant cause of morbidity. In the developed world, although vaccination strategies and ready access to antibiotics have meant that attitudes to infectious disease have relaxed in recent decades, the threats posed by the emergence of new pathogens and antibiotic-resistant strains, the increasing importance of viral diseases (e.g. norovirus, hepatitis, influenza, SARS), together with trends towards providing care in the community mean that the role of infectious disease prevention as part of public health is likely to increase rather than decrease in coming years. Most recently, outbreaks of SARS and concerns about avian flu have raised awareness of the need for effective and global strategies for preventing the spread of infectious disease in the home and community.                                                                       

What infectious diseases are associated with poor home hygiene?

Infectious diseases which commonly circulate in the home include respiratory infections (colds, flu) gut infections (food poisoning, norovirus/winter vomiting) skin and eye infections (MRSA, conjunctivitis). These infections are caused by bacteria, fungi or viruses etc. Some species of bacteria, fungi, viruses etc. (e.g. Salmonella, Campylobacter, influenza virus, norovirus) are highly “pathogenic”, whilst others are considered non-harmful and can even be beneficial to us (e.g. Lactobacilli in probiotics). Some species are sometimes harmless but sometimes harmful (E.coli, Staph aureus). 

In promoting home hygiene, it is important to know which infections are transmitted via food, water, hands, surfaces etc. These are the infections, as listed below,  for which hygiene is a contributory factor (although it may not be the only factor) in preventing their spread.  Other infections are transmitted from person-to-person only by close or direct personal contact, which means that home hygiene practices are not relevant to their prevention.

It is important to bear in mind that for any given microbial species, pathogenicity (ability to cause an infection) can vary considerably from one strain to another.   An example of this is E. coli. Most strains of E. coli form part of the normal intestinal microflora in humans and warm-blooded animals. However, some strains have the ability to cause disease in humans through the presence of specific virulence factors. These diseases include food poisoning, e.g. E. coli O157, or infections outside the intestinal tract such as urinary tract infections, and bacteraemia.