Abstract: A system and method for increasing customer safety by directly involving customers and reminding and rewarding workers of hand decontamination compliance issues within a facility to include a plurality of positive-reinforcement hand-hygiene stations; stations that provide a conveniently-located choice of hand-hygiene products such as soap or lotion; personnel identification tags for workers in the facility; readers at the hand-hygiene stations capable of detecting the presence of worker identification tags; a controller for detecting whether a worker tag accessed a hand decontamination station; devices to visually and audibly prompt and/or educate a worker or customer in the use of the hand wash station; a device to give a visual and audible reward for using a station; a device to issue rewards; and a plurality of computers to manage the system.

Abstract: A carrying case such as a backpack includes at least one visible exterior surface and an opposite interior surface. A child-appealing graphic image is disposed on a portion of the visible surface, and a plurality of light emitting diodes are attached to the visible surface at predetermined locations on the graphic image. A printed circuit board having driver circuitry thereon is disposed intermediate the exterior graphic image and the opposite interior surface. A battery module is fixedly coupled to the interior surface and electrically coupled to the driver circuitry to cause the light emitting diodes to blink. A switch (e.g. a tilt switch) is coupled between the battery module and the printed circuit board for controlling the application of power to the driver circuitry.