Boost sanitation to 'end poverty'
Increased sanitation spending and development would do more to end poverty than any other measure, study claims
Also In The News
|
Former US secretary of state Colin Powell has publicly backed Democratic candidate Barack Obama to become the next president of the United States. |  |
Monday, 20, Oct 2008 08:31
Greater efforts to improve water and sanitation in the world's poorest countries could help meet the Millennium Development Goal on poverty, the United Nations has claimed.
The UN University says providing toilets and safe sources of water is the most-effective route to reducing poverty.
A report out today said increased sanitation spending and development would "do more to end crippling poverty and improve world health than any other possible measure".
Poor health, especially chronic illness, can force a household below the poverty threshold, the UN says.
This becomes self-perpetuating as a poverty-stricken household is more prone to ill health.
Low education levels and lack of knowledge further maintain this cycle, as understanding links between hygiene and waterborne diseases tend to come more easily to households with higher education levels.
Diseases due to poor water, sanitation and hygiene account for an estimated ten per cent of the total global burden of illness.
Simply improving domestic water supply, sanitation and hand washing with soap can reduce illness rates by more than 25 per cent, the UN University claimed.
"Water problems, caused largely by an appalling absence of adequate toilets in many places, contribute tremendously to some of the world's most punishing problems, foremost among them the inter-related afflictions of poor health and chronic poverty," said Zafar Adeel, director of the UN University's Canadian-based International Network on Water, Environment and Health.
"It is astonishing that, despite all the attention these issues have received over decades, the world has not even properly mapped water and sanitation problems nor agreed on such terms as 'safe,' or 'adequate,' or 'accessible' or 'affordable,' all of which are in daily use by officials and policy-makers."
Globally, almost 900 million people lack access to safe water supplies and 2.5 billion people live without access to improved sanitation, at least 80 per cent of whom live in rural areas.
In 2002, the total number of deaths attributed to poor water, sanitation and hygiene was over 3.5 million.