Preventing Illness Doesn’t Need To Require Technology – Sometimes Just A Bar Of Soap

In this TED talk, Myriam Sidibe discusses the simple, cost-effective way to avoid the spread of viruses and disease: hand-washing.

This easy task cuts down risk of pneumonia, diarrhea, cholera and worse. Sidibe, a public-health expert, takes the TED stage to make a case for public-private partnerships to promote clean hands, as well as local, sustainable entrepreneurship.

As she points out, the amount of deaths in young kids because of preventable disease transfer ends up being the same as if 60 airplanes full of children crashed everyday. Diarrhea and pneumonia are the top killers of children under the age of five...