Include public health campaigns in lifestyle for a disease-free society

The Shanghai Health Commission announced at a media briefing on Sunday a month-long public health campaign to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus.

During the campaign, which kicked off the same day, the city's public health, environment and housing management departments and grassroots sectors will clean the environment and also eliminate mosquitoes and rats. The exercise will extend to 13,000 residential communities, 4,000 construction sites, 6,800 public toilets, 790 farm produce markets and 245,000 streetside businesses. At the briefing, the public were encouraged to actively participate in the campaign during which 500,000 copies of a guide on how to prevent and control the novel coronavirus from spreading will be handed out.

Public health campaigns have been a tradition since the founding of New China and are an excellent way of checking outbreaks, infectious diseases by promoting hygiene, cultivating healthy habits and cleaning the environment.

The sudden outbreak of the novel coronavirus once again emphasizes the importance of keeping our environment clean and inculcating healthy personal habits to prevent and control the spread of pathogens. Although the spread of the novel coronavirus has been effectively curbed in a majority of regions in China, we still cannot breathe easy. Cleaning the environment is the most effective and basic way to eliminate the possibility of the virus spreading. It is expected that a health campaign involving the general public will help society eventually win the battle against the virus.

Moreover, improving public hygiene and health consciousnesses is a low-cost measure to ensure disease prevention and control and reap long-term benefits for both individuals and society. We should actually encourage public health campaigns to an extent that hygienic habits become a part of people's daily life.