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WHO, UNICEF: 25% of health care facilities lack basic water services
Globally, one in four health care facilities lacks basic water service, and one in five has no sanitation service, according to a report by the WHO and UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene.
Of the health care facilities that lack basic water services, the agencies said over 2 billion people are impacted. Of the facilities that lack sanitation service, 1.5 billion are impacted, they reported.
“Water, sanitation and hygiene services in health care facilities are the most basic requirements of infection prevention and control, and of quality care,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said in a news release. “They are fundamental to respecting the dignity and human rights of every person who seeks heath care and health workers themselves.”
The program highlights WHO and UNICEF 2030 Sustainable Development Goal targets, including by 2030, achieving universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all, and achieving access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and ending open defecation, “paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations.”
WHO and UNICEF released a report titled “WASH in Health Care Facilities” that found that basic water services were available in just 55% of health care facilities in least developed countries (LDCs). They also reported that each year, 17 million women in the LDCs give birth in health centers with inadequate water, sanitation and hygiene.
The organizations released an accompanying report titled “Water, sanitation and hygiene in health care facilities: Practical steps to achieve universal access for quality care.” In the report, researchers wrote that more than 1 million deaths per year are associated with unclean births. They also reported that infections accounted for 26% of neonatal deaths and 11% of maternal mortality.
“Imagine giving birth or taking your sick child to a health center with no safe water, toilets or hand-washing facilities,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, MSc, said in the release.
Earlier this year, the WHO executive board approved a resolution on water, sanitation and hygiene in health care facilities. Governments will debate the resolution in May at the World Heath Assembly, according to the release.
References:
WHO and UNICEF. WASH in Health Care Facilities. 2019. https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/311620/9789241515504-eng.pdf.
WHO and UNICEF. Water, sanitation, and hygiene in health care facilities; Practical steps to achieve universal access to quality care. 2019. https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/311618/9789241515511-eng.pdf.
Disclosures: Guterres and Tedros report no relevant financial disclosures.