Princess Diana shook the hand of an unnamed HIV patient, we don't have his name. She was trying to pass on the message that you cannot get HIV from shaking hands. Prince Harry has been quoted as saying she knew exactly what she was doing. This was very intentional on her side.
Friends do it, strangers do it and so do chimpanzees - and it's not just deeply embedded in our history and culture, it may even be written in our DNA. The humble handshake, it turns out, has a rich and surprising history. In this week's episode palaeoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to science broadcaster Helen Czerski about a funny and fascinating voyage of discovery - from the handshake's origins (at least seven million years ago) all the way to its sudden disappearance in March 2020.
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