How to Actually Stop Touching Your Face

We do that hundreds of times a day without even realizing it

It takes time, but we can retrain the habit of touching our face to make it less likely we catch an infection. Krakenimages.com/Shuttertock

Health care professionals keep saying avoid touching your face as protection from COVID-19, but it’s a lot easier said than done.

Whether it’s scratching an itch or resting our chins in our hands, the coronavirus outbreak has made many of us aware of the urge to reach for our faces—and we do it a lot. A 2015 study in the American Journal of Infection Control observed a group of medical students touching their faces an average 23 times an hour.