Category Archives: Sanitation

Huge number of deaths linked to superbugs can be avoided, say experts

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Models suggest deaths in poorer countries could be cut by 18% – or about 750,000 a year – with preventive measures

Every year 750,000 deaths linked to drug-resistant superbugs could be prevented through better access to clean water and sanitation, infection control and childhood vaccinations, research suggests.

Antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, is a huge global challenge, with the evolution of drug-resistant superbugs, driven by factors including inappropriate and excessive antibiotic use, raising the prospect of a future where modern medicine fails.

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Bindeshwar Pathak, ‘toilet man’ who revolutionised sanitation in India, dies at 80

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Sociologist made it his mission to install more than 1m toilets after being horrified by the work of manual scavengers

From the moment he reached adulthood until his death on Tuesday at 80, Bindeshwar Pathak poured his life and energy into making India a cleaner place by building public toilets and enabling Indians from across the social spectrum to have access to clean sanitation.

Over the years, he earned himself the name “Toilet Man”, horrifying his family and fellow Brahmins, the caste to which he belonged. His community was aghast at his obsession with setting up public toilets; for many, toilets were considered something unclean, never to be touched.

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After the inferno: Sierra Leone’s poorest struggle to recover from slum fire – in pictures

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A blaze ripped through the overcrowded settlement of Susan’s Bay in Freetown in March, injuring hundreds. British photographer Henry Kamara, of Sierra Leone descent, documents the aftermath in this coastal community as people try to rebuild their lives

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UK to slash funding for overseas water and sanitation projects by 80%

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Scale of aid cut emerges in leaked FCDO memo, prompting experts to describe it as ‘a national shame’

The UK is to slash funding for lifesaving water, sanitation and hygiene projects in developing nations by more than 80%, according to a leaked memo.

The cuts have been described as “savage”, “incredible” and “a national shame” by experts highlighting that sanitation and handwashing is a key line of defence during the coronavirus pandemic. The reduction to the bilateral aid budget was revealed as details emerged of cuts in the foreign aid budget.

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What a dump! Why ‘wild toileting’ has become a big pandemic problem

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The number of people doing their business alfresco has shot up. But what else can you do when nature calls and there aren’t any public loos?

Name: Wild toileting.

Age: Dates back to Homo erectus. Urinating and defecating are part of the human condition – “I shit, therefore I am” (“Coshito, ergo sum”), as Descartes almost said – and were undomesticated until the Mesopotamians invented toilets almost 4,500 years ago.

Appearance: Don’t even think about it.

Is there a lot of it about? According to the Lulworth Estate, which manages Durdle Door and the surrounding coastline in Dorset, far too much. It says it saw a huge increase in “wild toileting” when lockdown was lifted last summer. It is calling on Boris Johnson to make responsible tourism a priority when travel restrictions ease this spring.

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Narendra Modi to face down critics by hailing Clean India scheme a success

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Prime minister’s announcement of an end to open defecation in India marred by claims of coercion and violence

Narendra Modi is to declare that his flagship sanitation programme has ended open defecation in India, amid accusations that the scheme has sparked violence and abuse.

India’s prime minister will make the announcement on Wednesday at an event in his home state of Gujarat, attended by 20,000 village chiefs and international dignitaries, according to the government.

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Sewage, Zika virus – and the team in Brazil mapping disease hotspots | Dom Phillips

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Volunteers in Salvador’s favelas are collecting data on deadly infections and inequality to help campaign for better sanitation

Wearing crisp, white T-shirts and carrying tablets, the students fan out through Marechal Rondon – a bustling favela spread over hillsides and a valley in Brazil’s north-eastern city of Salvador. As they walk, they map blocked drains and piles of rubbish on their tablets. These are the “infection points” that attract the rats and mosquitoes which, in turn, spread diseases like leptospirosis and the Zika virus, both prevalent here.

Student Alexandre Santos, 20, stops before a weigh-high tangle of wild plants overlooking a housing block. “We look at sewers, rubble, garbage. Now there is high vegetation,” Santos says, tapping in the data. “It goes straight into the data bank.”

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‘My message is simple: use the toilet’: tackling open defecation in Nigeria

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Regular patrols are helping to ensure villagers in Kano state are practising good hygiene, to improve sanitation and cut disease

When Nasiru Ibrahim goes on patrol around his village, he’s not looking out for criminal activities, or the usual community problems. Instead, Ibrahim is making sure people in Yammawar Kafawa, in northern Nigeria’s Kano state, are using toilets.

Last October, the villagers agreed to stop defecating in fields, bushes and streets, and instead use the newly-built toilets, as part of the Nigerian government’s drive to end open defecation by 2025.

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‘Hygiene is the first priority’: Nepal looks to clean up its act on sepsis

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In a country where dirty water and poor sanitation jeopardise the lives of millions, moves are afoot to improve health facilities

It was midnight when Kalpana and Rohit Agri had to take their three-day-old daughter, Kritima, to Bardiya hospital in western Nepal. She was listless and, despite the antibiotics she’d been prescribed, had developed a high fever. Hearing her struggling to breathe, they woke a neighbour to take them.

Kritima was admitted with life-threatening neonatal sepsis, probably an infection she had picked up in the hospital where she was born.

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Housing in sub-Saharan Africa improves but millions of people live in slums

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Study identifies major transformation in quality of living conditions, but governments urged to improve urban sanitation

From cities to the countryside, Africa has undergone a dramatic transformation in living conditions over the past 15 years, according to a new study.

But the research, based on state of the art mapping and published in science journal Nature, also found that almost half of the the urban population – 53 million people across the countries analysed – were living in slum conditions.

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Tired of dark fields and jeering men: the bride who led a ‘toilet revolution’ | Amrit Dhillon

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Komal Hadala’s hellish treks to relieve herself inspired a campaign that left her Indian village flushed with success

The day after her wedding, Komal Hadala was shaken awake at 4am by her mother-in-law. They joined a group of women who were waiting outside the house, in Nithora village, Uttar Pradesh.

“It was the time when they went outdoors to relieve themselves in the fields before men started appearing. I couldn’t believe it. It was total darkness outside. And it had been raining,” says Hadala.

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