Cross-cultural communication （108）　

108) Paper towels
Since the spring of 2020, the use of paper towels has spread in various places due to the impact of COVID-19 infection, rather than the use of ordinary cloth towels. In medical institutions, of course, but also in department stores, hotels, and train stations, warm air dryers have been the mainstream until now, but for the reason that they promote viral infection, they are gradually being replaced by paper towels. As a doctor, I had always washed my hands before the COVID pandemic, especially during the winter flu season, every time I examined a patient. However, the hand towels at that time were cloth towels.

When I stopped practicing at my office in 2016 and started working at a nursing home, the hand towels at all the locations with running water were paper towels. For myself, I found paper towels much more comfortable than cloth towels, not only for infection prevention. There is no reason why a dry, clean (almost) paper towel would not be more comfortable than a cloth towel that has been used many times and is damp (and possibly has viruses on it).

Personally, I have another thought. I think that this is what has finally allowed Japan to join the ranks of developed countries. This is based on my experience of living in US as a resident doctor for three years from 1980, three years after graduating from medical school in Japan. At that time, Japan had become a reasonably developed country, and I thought that living in America wouldn't be that surprising. It may seem strange, but the thing that surprised me most when I first arrived in America was that, wherever you went in the city, there were always paper towels available for washing your hands. This was true not only in hospitals, but also in department stores and even in the dirty public toilets in the city. So even at that time, there was no need to carry a handkerchief with you to wipe your hands in America. I worked and lived in New York City, but this was not because it was a big city. Even when I went quite far out into the suburbs on holiday, paper towels were available everywhere. However, despite the fact that paper towels were widely available from the 1980s (or even earlier), it is ironic that the US has the highest number of COVID infections and deaths in the world. In my opinion, one of the reasons for this is that there are so many people who don't wash their hands in the first place, even though there are paper towels in even the most run-down toilets.

Even if the COVID becomes a common virus like the flu in the near future, there is a great possibility that new viruses will become prevalent in the future. In order to prevent this from happening, I hope that the habit of using paper towels will continue in Japan.

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