Your child's safety

Having a basic first aid kit at home is essential for minor accidents and coughs and colds. Suggested items are:

• plasters in a variety of different sizes and shapes 
• small, medium and large sterile gauze dressings 
• at least 2 sterile eye dressings 
• triangular bandages 
• crêpe rolled bandages 
• safety pins 
• disposable sterile gloves 
• tweezers 
• scissors 
• alcohol-free cleansing wipes 
• sticky tape 
• thermometer (preferably digital) 
• skin rash cream, such as hydrocortisone or calendula 
• cream or spray to relieve insect bites and stings 
• antiseptic cream 
• painkillers such as paracetamol (or infant paracetamol for children), aspirin (not to be given to children under 16), or ibuprofen 
• cough medicine 
• antihistamine cream or tablets 
• distilled water for cleaning wounds 
• eye wash and eye bath 

It may also be useful to keep a basic first aid manual or instruction booklet with your first aid kit. Medicines should be checked regularly to make sure they're within their use-by dates.

Food should be prepared, cooked, stored and handled correctly; otherwise, your child could become ill with food poisoning, colds, flu and other conditions.

Good food hygiene means knowing how to avoid the spread of bacteria when cooking, preparing and storing food. Foods that aren’t cooked, stored and handled correctly can cause food poisoning and other conditions.

4 steps to food safety

There are four basic steps to food safety at home; these are known as the four Cs:

• Cleaning – making sure your hands, surfaces and equipment are clean before, during and after cooking

• Cooking – making sure food is cooked throughout to kill harmful bacteria
• Chilling – making sure foods are stored at the correct temperature to prevent the growth of harmful bacteria
• Avoiding cross-contamination – preventing the spread of bacteria to surfaces and ready-to-eat food

Washing your hands properly removes dirt, viruses and bacteria to stop them spreading to other people and objects, which can spread illnesses such as flu, diarrhoea and food poisoning. It can help stop people from picking up infections and spreading them to others.

It’s also really important for children to learn how and when to keep their hands clean too, as it stops germs from spreading and helps prevent your child and those around them from getting an infection.

How to wash hands

Use warm water and soap and make up a lather on both sides of the hands, wrists, between the fingers and around the nails. (It's a good idea to remove jewellery if possible, before washing your hands.)

You should wash your hands for the amount of time it takes to sing "Happy Birthday" time (around 40 seconds in total)

When to wash hands

• Before eating or touching food
• After using the toilet
• After blowing your nose or coughing
• After having contact with pets or other animals
• After playing outside
• Before and after visiting a sick friend or relative
• When hands are dirty

Keeping your home clean helps to avoid germs spreading and causing illnesses. A germ is a microbe that causes disease. Not all microbes are germs – there are many microbes in our environment that do not, or only rarely cause infection.

In any home there will be many millions of microbes including some germs. Good hygiene doesn’t mean getting rid of all the germs in the whole house; it means getting rid of as many germs as possible, where and when there is a risk of them spreading and causing infection.

A healthy place to live

Washing with hot, soapy water and using disinfectants to clean floors and surfaces, and washing laundry at the right temperature to kill germs can help make your home a healthy place to live.

Cleaning means removing visible dirt by vacuum cleaning, damp dusting, or washing with warm water and detergent. Cleaning removes dirt and some germs but does not necessarily reduce them to a ‘safe’ level.

Hygienic cleaning means removing dirt and getting rid of as many germs as possible, either by removing them or killing them by disinfecting.

• Removing germs can be by thorough cleaning with hot water and detergent and then rinsing to remove the germs.
• Disinfection can be achieved using heat or by using a product that states it ‘kills’ germs
• Sometimes a combination of removal and killing is used.

After hygienic cleaning, surfaces should be dried. Drying can be by air drying, tumble drying, hanging to dry or by using clean towels, cloths or paper towels on surfaces.

It’s also really important for you, your child and others in your household to keep your hands clean to help stop germs from spreading.