The Healthspan Map · Habits (Ch4) - Quick-wins

Food & hand hygiene

What this is linked to

Where Food & hand hygiene is linked — 3 sources.In the order the Map holds them: strongest evidence first. That is a statement about the evidence, not about what matters most.
Nutrient or lever	Direction	Strength	Evidence type	What was found	Source
Food & hand hygiene	Do this	Strong	Established clinical	Refrigerate perishables within 2h (1h above 90F); the 40-140F danger zone and handwashing prevent foodborne GI illness.	Food safety & hand hygiene (CDC) (opens in a new tab)
Food & hand hygiene	Do this	Strong	Systematic review	Hand hygiene produced an ~11% relative reduction in respiratory illness (RR 0.89), a top low-cost prevention behaviour.	Physical interventions to interrupt respiratory-virus spread (Cochrane 2020) (opens in a new tab)
Food & hand hygiene	Do this	Moderate	Systematic review	Handwashing with soap reduces respiratory infections (~24% pooled), lowering infection burden.	Handwashing & infection (opens in a new tab)