Handshakes reconsidered during flu season

French authorities are discouraging pecks on the cheek, but disease experts say Americans might also modify their standard form of greeting in light of the flu season.

Public health departments in Linn and Johnson counties are advising churches to evaluate handshaking during services, and businesses, too, might want to reconsider the custom.

Shaking hands can spread H1N1 or other viruses if someone has sneezed or coughed into their hands or touched a surface with a virus.

“If we could limit that kind of contact it would reduce transmission.” said Dr. Dan Diekema, associate epidemiologist at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City. “The problem is trying to balance our social customs and social graces with hygiene.”

Diekema said viruses can live two to eight hours on surfaces, such as doorknobs, and likely two hours or so on hands.

Viruses do not enter through unbroken skin. The risk occurs when a person shakes someone's hand or touches a surface with a virus, then touches their eyes, nose or mouth.

Thorough, frequent handwashing for at least 20 seconds with soap and water (the time it takes to sing the ABC song) or using gel hand sanitizers can reduce the risk of transmission.

A greater risk than a handshake is coughing or sneezing directly onto a person, the reason viruses spread so easily at home, schools and daycares, and reasoning behind social distancing that calls for staying 3-6 feet away from ill people.

Diekema said authorities are still learning how efficiently the H1N1 virus, commonly called swine flu, is spread.

Because the virus is new and no vaccine is available yet, an abundance of caution is advised.

“That's why it's important to have good hand hygiene,” Diekema said. “Then you don't have to worry about it.”