Google Doodle celebrates Ignaz Semmelweis and the importance of hand-washing
Today's Google Doodle is in honour of Ignaz Semmelweis, a German-Hungarian physician who discovered that hand-washing dramatically reduced deaths of women during childbirth.
The timely animation shows a range of different techniques to help make sure you're washing your hands effectively - as the world faces the spread of deadly bug .
Who was Ignaz Semmelweis?
Today's Google Doodle, Semmelweis was a physician and scientist born in Buda, the ancient capital of the Kingdom of Hungary - now the western part of Budapest.
He was born July 1, 1818 and passed away in a mental hospital in August 13, 1865.
The physician is famous for introducing hand disinfection standards in obstetrical care.
He's even been described as the 'father of infection control', although it was only after his heath that his beliefs around cleanliness were recognised as germ theory of disease was widely accepted.
Why are Google Doodle celebrating Ignaz Semmelweis?
According to the World Health Organisation, thorough hand-washing is a key way of preventing the spread of coronavirus.
WHO advise frequent hand-washing with soap and water or using an alcohol-based hand sanitiser.
On March 20, 1847, Semmelweis emphasised the importance of having clean hands when he became chief resident in the maternity clinic of the Vienna General Hospital.
He demanded that all physicians disinfect their hands with a solution made from chlorinated lime.
What is a Google Doodle?
In 1998, the search engine founders Larry and Sergey drew a stick figure behind the second 'o' of Google as a message to that they were out of office at the Burning Man festival and with that, Google Doodles were born.
The company decided that they should decorate the logo to mark cultural moments and it soon became clear that users really enjoyed the change to the Google homepage.
In that same year, a turkey was added to Thanksgiving and two pumpkins appeared as the 'o's for Halloween the following year.
Now, there is a full team of doodlers, illustrators, graphic designers, animators and classically trained artists who help create what you see on those days.
Among the Doodles published in past months were designs commemorating German scientist Robert Koch, Jan Ingenhousz (who discovered photosynthesis) and the 50th anniversary of kids coding languages being introduced.
And the search giant celebrated the 2017 Autumn Equinox , which marked the official ending of summer and the coming of autumn.