Background: Since the emergence of COVID-19 pandemic in 2019, public health awareness and behavioural changes are vital to stop the disease transmission across the globe. However, not all communities have the same level of health literacy due to lack of formal education on basic hygiene. Hence, the UK Health Security Agency has introduced the e-bug programme to distribute knowledge covering microorganisms, hygiene, disease transmission and their preventive measure.
Objective. This study aimed to determine the effectiveness of the e-bug programme in educating primary school children on different types of hygiene; investigate the effectiveness of e-bug based on their age and gender and association between the perceived environmental quality of life (QoL) and children’s hygiene knowledge.
Method. A pilot study was done amongst 14 children aged 7-12 years from Project Perumahan Rakyat (PPR) Sri Pantai, Malaysia. Online self-administered questionnaire was used for data collection, including personal information, pre and post-interventional of hygiene score and environmental QoL score. Effectiveness of e-bug, association between effectiveness and demographic factor and correlation between QoL and hygiene knowledge was analysed by paired sample t-test, independent t-test and Bivariate Pearson correlation test, respectively.
Results. A significant improvement was found in hand hygiene (p=0.019) and overall score (p=0.048) by comparing the pre and post score after e-bug intervention.
Conclusion. The e-bug programme has generally improved the knowledge of hygiene among primary school children, particularly hand hygiene. Hence, we recommend the e-bug programme to be implemented in primary schools in Malaysia to promote better quality of health.
e-bug, effectiveness, children, hygiene knowledge, hand hygiene, respiratory hygiene, oral hygiene, food hygiene