Give Me 5: Safeguard Celebrates Its 5th Global Handwashing Day

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Handwashing with soap is the most effective and inexpensive way to prevent diarrhea and acute respiratory infections, which take the lives of millions of children in developing countries.

Procter & Gamble, through its flagship soap brand Safeguard, and its partners

continue their commitment to promote proper handwashing with soap.

October 15 marks the annual Global Handwashing Day (GHD), which aims to promote the importance of handwashing with soap to avoid diseases. More than 3.5 million children under 5 years old die every year from diarrhea and pneumonia-related diseases worldwide. In the Philippines, diarrhea and pneumonia are also among the top causes of death among children under 5 years old. The simple act of handwashing with soap at 5 critical times – before eating, before handling food, after using the toilet, after handling pets and after playtime – is proven to be an effective and affordable way to prevent potentially deadly diseases among children.

This year, Procter & Gamble, through its flagship soap brand Safeguard, the Department of Education, the Department of Health, UNICEF, Fit for School and Play Pilipinas, aim to help more children reach their 5^th birthday. As the key soap partner of Global Handwashing Day in the Philippines since 2008, Safeguard kicks off its 5^th year celebration of GHD early to educate more Filipinos about the lifesaving habit of handwashing with soap. 

At a media event this morning , (September 21) at Museo Pambata with the theme - 

Give Me 5! ,  Safeguard announces its plans to make its 5^th year bigger and better. 

Kids washing their hands at Safeguard’s Pre-Global Handwashing Day
Press Conference

Kids washing their hands with UNICEF Chief of Water,
Sanitation and Hygiene Tim Grieve

Kids washing their hands with DepEd Asst. Sec for
Legal Affairs Atty. Tonisito Umali

Kids washing their hands with Brand Manager for
Safeguard Jun Guevara

“Safeguard is committed to promote health and hygiene among Filipino families. On our 5^th year of celebrating Global Handwashing Day in the Philippines, we continue to advocate the importance of handwashing with soap, especially after an often forgotten critical time for handwashing – after playtime,” shared Mr. Jun Guevara, Brand Manager for Safeguard. In partnership with playtime expert Play Pilipinas, Safeguard announced its donation of 5 playgrounds in partnership with playtime expert Play Pilipinas. Created by finalists from Play Pilipinas’ design competition last year, these playgrounds are made from sustainable materials, proven to be safe and equipped with handwashing stations. These handwashing stations will enable children to wash their hands after playtime – 1 of 5 critical times for handwashing – for safe and healthy play free from disease-causing germs.

Safeguard invites everyone to join 5^th year of Global Handwashing Day in the Philippines. Join the celebration by tweeting with hashtag #Happy5thGHD. 

Watch out for more activities from Safeguard in the coming weeks. But, most importantly, don’t forget to wash your hands with soap!

About Procter & Gamble: Four billion times a day, P&G brands touch the lives of people around the world. The company has one of the strongest portfolios of trusted, quality, leadership brands, including Pampers®, Tide®, Ariel®, Always®, Whisper®, Pantene®, Mach3®, Bounty®, Dawn®, Pringles®, Folgers®, Charmin®, Downy®, Lenor®, Iams®, Crest®, Oral-B®, Actonel®, Duracell®, Olay®, Head & Shoulders®, Wella®, Gillette®, and Braun®.  The P&G community consists of over 135,000 employees working in over 80 countries worldwide.  In 2010, we celebrated 75 years of operations in the Philippines.  Please visit http://www.pg.com for the latest news and in-depth information about P&G and its brands.