I find hand sanitizer keeps me from touching my face. Maybe I have bad stuff, but it smells BAD. Either too fruity or too Lysol-y or too perfumey.

If my hand gets near my face, I am instantly reminded by the smell, "don't do that!".

I think we should be pushing smelly hand sanitizers!

I read where someone wrote NO on the back of their hands. Yes, scented soaps or sanitizers should stop us when they get close enough to smell.

The gloves make no sense, although the spikes would help. I’d feel silly in them.

I had a friend who wrote "NO" on the back of each hand. :)

I touch my own face way more than I should. I'm working on it, and have briefly debated the "no" idea. She said it's helping her.

Ded - great minds cross post at the exact same time!

Patrice, too funny.

No. I think some of the prophylactic measures already being undertaken are reactionary and pointless and would consider the wearing of gloves to be in that vein. YMMV.

It is stupidly hard to not touch your face. I'm trying my best to break this habit since it will help my health in general. But wearing glasses, bangs etc...it is really a challenge!

The other day I saw a picture of the Queen wearing disposable gloves while shaking hands with people.

Make sure you buy the hand sanitizers with 60% alcohol and remember they don't kill all germs. I like how Walmart keeps sanitizer wipes next to the carts to wipe them down with before using.

I too, am trying to not touch my face and didn't realize how often I do! My late MIL went to nursing school in the mid 40's and apparently they received demerits whenever an instructor caught them touching their face. Fast forward to now and when I asked my daughter who recently graduated as an RN, if there was such a thing, she said it was mentioned in the same vein as hand washing, but was enforced and they weren't reprimanded for doing it.

The Queen was wearing gloves, but not disposables.

I cannot wear vinyl gloves for such a long time, as they make my hands too sweaty - which can be a sanitary problem as well.

Listened to this OnTheMedia interview with Laurie Garrett the other day and she said she wears nylon gloves out & about, and was also talking about her conscious effort to remember not to touch her face, and also pointed out that many people do not remove gloves properly to avoid contamination. She is someone who knows very well about epidemics...

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/epidemic-voyeurs-no-more

There are also links to some good info:

"Back in 2014, at the height of deaths from Ebola in Western Africa, and at the height of Ebola panic here in the United States, On the Media produced an "Infectious Disease" edition of our Breaking News Consumer’s Handbook. We advised that early reports are often frantic and incomplete, and that noise level wouldn’t necessarily match risk level, and that if the CDC says don’t worry, don’t worry. This week, after a CDC official told the press and the public to prepare for "significant disruption of our lives," that script flipped.

Such a disruption here would come as a shock to many Americans. Not so for Pulitzer Prize–winning science writer Laurie Garrett, author of The Coming Plague, who has observed many outbreaks up close, and whose mission lately is to inform her fellow Americans about the nature of contagions and to provide fact-based advice to a people more accustomed to being, as she calls them, “epidemic voyeurs.” In this segment, Brooke and Garrett discuss what to expect as COVID-19 makes its way through a ruptured body politic, caught off-guard.

Further reading: "The Wuhan Virus: How To Stay Safe," by Laurie Garrett, published by Foreign Policy on January 25, 2020. Garrett also recommends reading coronavirus coverage and commentary from STAT's Helen Branswell, Science Mag's Jon Cohen and Kai Kupferschmidt, and John Hopkins's Tom Inglesby.

This is a segment from our February 28th, 2020 program, Black Swans."

That said, my biggest issue is my nose always gets itchy!

And it's been weirdly funny to see so many officials right now caught on video doing exactly what they're telling us all NOT to do 😬

I got way fewer colds when I stopped rubbing my eyes. I work in a school with young kids and it seemed I had a cold every other month. I've always tried not to put my fingers in my mouth or near my nose, but avoiding rubbing my eyes made a big difference.

I can see your point about gloves, but if you have a job that involves a lot of contact with customers, cash handling, etc., you can only use hand sanitizer/wipes so much before your skin dries out/cracks, increasing the chances of virus transmission. That's where gloves come in handy. I've also heard that people who wear gloves are less likely to touch their faces because it just feels weird to touch your face with a gloved hand.

Thanks Gray, they looked like disposables because of the length. I think the virus is in OK now. I'm not going to worry about gloves because you can get it so many different ways, even from cash. Not even masks prevents it. Stay home, eat, read, and try not to touch my face after grocery shopping or going to the pharmacy which I need to do tomorrow. Yikes.

I woke up Tuesday morning with some type of 48 hour virus and I hadn't been anywhere in a few days, although people had come to my house, & they weren't sick, and still not sick. Who knows how we get it?

LOLOLOL!!!

OP here, thanks for your responses. Well I guess I forgot that gloves with rubber spikes have already been invented, for pet grooming. I think anyone would absolutely be dissuaded from rubbing their eyes or touching their nose or mouth, while wearing these gloves, lol!

https://www.amazon.ca/TIIARS-Grooming-Gloves-Efficient-Remover/dp/B07PN335HJ

Haha - that was one of the incidents I was referring to! The Daily Show had a recent montage of many people doing similar stuff.

I have never understood that habit of licking one's finger before turning a page - or especially counting paper money! I recall some cashiers doing that to give me change in the past and boy, is that awkward 😧

I already have them! DD put these in my stocking at Christmas!

People lick their fingers because often pages stick together and a slightly damp finger does provide a bit more purchase on the surface to make turning them easier. That's not to say it's still not gross though. There are actually little barbed rubber thimbles that are made for this very purpose and help when one has masses of paperwork to flip through.

Why is it that when someone says, "Don't touch your face," my eye waters or my nose or cheek itches? The mind works in intersting ways.