The Scotsman: Are Children Too Clean?

The Scotsman – April 29, 2008

There was a time, in the days before anti-bacterial wipes, sprays and ointments, when children and nature were at one, not separated by the substantial layers of cotton wool that parents are so often accused of swaddling them in today.

This was a golden age when children could pick up unidentified objects in the street and shove them in their mouths largely unnoticed; when bathing involved the occasional scrub behind the ears whenever you were too slow to wriggle free of your mother's grip; and where snotty-nosed urchins mixed freely, coated in a paste of outside dirt and body fluids (not all their own).

Today, anyone would think that children are supposed to be clean. Terrified yummy mummies and faddy daddies spend their days wiping down their pristine infants with chemicals and keeping them indoors lest they are seen as bad parents for allowing their children to come in contact with a germ-ridden world. Well, such harassed parents may now be able to put down the wetwipes with a sigh of relief as two separate studies reveal that grimy youngsters might not be such a bad thing.

Research by the University of California has shown that children who interact with other youngsters early in life by attending playgroups or nursery have about a 30 per cent lower chance of developing leukaemia than those who don't, while German scientists announced yesterday that a six-year study had found having a dog in the house substantially reduces the risk that young children will develop allergic responses such as asthma, eczema and hay fever.

"This falls in line with the hygiene hypothesis," says Lindsay McManus of Allergy UK. "There's strong evidence to suggest that now that we live much more sterile lives than we did 30 years ago, and aren't exposed to the same microbes we once were, our bodies are more likely to look for allergies that are otherwise harmless.

"There's evidence that children who grow up on farms are less likely to develop allergies. When the Berlin Wall came down, allergies were pretty much non-existent in less-developed East Germany but, as the area adopted Western hygiene practices, allergies began to appear. This theory could extend to owning a pet in early childhood or interacting with other children at a pre-school age."

While it's nice to think the findings might prompt a little parental relaxation and allow more children to explore the world around them without the interference of dirt-paranoid adults, it may well take a long time for the message to filter through. "Parents have certainly become more concerned regarding exposure to germs in recent years, and this is evident from the questions parents will ask when visiting the nursery," says Karen Murray, the area manager at Cranley Nursery in Edinburgh. "One of the most common questions is on our policy on children attending when unwell, and while a child with a contagious infection cannot attend, we consider each case individually.

"Children frequently have common colds and viral infections and, if the child was excluded each time they had one, it would be a very difficult situation for a working parent. It is actually beneficial for children to attend nursery and mix with other children. Exposure to germs helps to strengthen and build their immune system. The key to a healthy child is getting the balance right between taking adequate precautions and 'germ-proofing' your child."

It's little wonder that some parents resort to the germ-proofing approach. Health scares and superbugs make for eye-catching headlines. A lucrative market in hygiene products is promoted by television adverts showing malevolent bacteria marching their way across a child's highchair. Industry reports state the global anti-infective market is currently valued at $66.5 billion (£34 billion) with antibacterial agents accounting for over 50 per cent of sales. The antibacterial market is set to grow to more than $45.0 billion(£22.5 billion) by 2012.

"Parents are just bombarded with scary advertising about making their children and their homes germ free these days. They want to do the best for their child, so often they'll buy into it," says clinical child psychologist Joyce Davies from Lerwick Health Centre.

However, the risk is that paranoia about hygiene leads to a childhood devoid of the same freedom and levels of interaction that previous generations have enjoyed.

"It is possible to over-protect your children which can be harmful," explains Davies. "They won't learn appropriate levels of independence and they could worry more than other children. It's likely that, as they grow up, they won't take risks, which, of course, is one of the ways they develop and learn."

Certainly it's easy to get nostalgic about the "good old days" and some dangers are very real. Dr Sally Bloomfield, the chairman of the International Forum on Home Hygiene, says: "While these studies show that exposure to microbes and dirt may be a good thing for children, it's important to remember that infection is not a good thing, and good hygiene is important for fighting off infection.

"We've got cleanliness and hygiene confused; It's not about sterilising your home, but it's about things such as washing your hands properly and handling food carefully. If you can wash your hands with soap and rinse them with water, that's all you need. If you're out and about and can't rinse your hands, then these antibacterial hand cleaners can be useful."

The key, according to parenting experts, is getting the balance right. Linda Russell, the director of the Parent Coaching Studio, says that obsessing about cleanliness is counterproductive. "Parents are faced with TV adverts about disinfecting every element of their lives, but building up a bit of immunity is a good thing. I advise parents to be sensible, not anxious. "

Elaine Griffiths, the editor of Prima Baby magazine, agrees. "We're constantly wiping our children down and swabbing them with all sorts of chemicals when we should actually be just letting them be children. You do have to take hygiene seriously, but there's lots of evidence to suggest that grubby is good for children. I think that both of these studies are great news for parents. It takes a bit of the strain off my shoulders, and, frankly, knowing that my children don't have to be squeaky-clean all the time is a bit of a relief!"

So, might we see a return to the halcyon days when children were free to play in filth and return caked in mud in time for dinner? With other external concerns facing parents today, from strangers to traffic, the answer is probably no. However, overall, it's probably good news for children across the land who may finally manage to dodge that daily scrub behind the ears.

'Mud, glorious mud – and corned beef with a live bluebottle as vitamin supplement'

Jim Gilchrist

I'M AS old as the National Health Service. I grew up dosed with the proverbial cod liver oil and orange juice, but also with my immune system liberally boosted by regular and vigorous contact with dirt, with other grubby kids and with assorted livestock, furry or otherwise.

We're told that children who interact with other youngsters early in life are at lower risk of contracting various malaises, that living with a dog reduces the risk of allergies. Well what's new? Growing up in a small west-of-Scotland town, in a neighbourly terrace largely populated by two-boy-one-dog families, we industriously rendered ourselves immune to the worst that the microbial world could throw at us.

We interacted all right – with each other, often quite messily and sometimes bloodily, with our pets, and particularly with the burn at the foot of the brae. This may sound like some pastoral idyll, but the burn was a slurry-coloured Styx, into which the local paper mill discharged obscure toxins that created glooping mats of Guinness-like froth, into which we frequently tumbled. Captain Ahab sighting the White Whale would be as nothing to our frenzy if we saw a fish – even if it was, inevitably, belly up.

We established a gang hut in a disused henhouse, papering its interior with centre-fold cutaways of trains, planes and spaceships from the Eagle. This didn't quite eliminate the overall patina of chicken excrement, but it helped. Budding David Attenboroughs to a man, we were all closely – sometimes extremely closely – acquainted with the natural world. I recall visiting one friend, laid up with mumps or some such viral rite of passage, and, as we chatted, a lively infestation of pet white mice suddenly erupted from the depths of his pyjamas, to skitter about the bed – immune system enhancement as you've never seen it.

The interaction continued apace, with hijacked soup pots, noisesome with stagnating tadpoles, and old sinks full of captured newts and toads – Jurassic Park with added mud. There was the nettle-rich, grassy brae at the end of the street down which we rolled, in fun or internecine conflict, sometimes through inconveniently placed dog turds and, on one notable occasion, through some dumped axle grease, which required my mother to use Oxydol or some such decidedly non-biological laundry powder to scrub the stuff out of my hair.

And that's before we even mention Scout camp, and the delights of ash-encrusted damper-on-a-stick, or corned beef with live bluebottle as added vitamin supplement… but that's another story, and, one supposes, another biohazard. An alarming number of decades on, I'm still here, hale and sometimes even hearty. Although I do have very little hair: maybe it was the Oxydol.

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