World Toilet Day is celebrated every year on November 19th. Its purpose is to promote better sanitation, and hygiene habits, and to understand the role of sanitation in disease prevention and health improvement. What goes in, must come out: It's a universal rule for every human being on this planet. Eventually, we all find ourselves needing to use the toilet.
World Toilet Day 2024 Theme: 'Toilets: A Place for Peace'
'Toilets: A Place for Peace' theme this year focuses on the impact of poor sanitation on people's lives and the importance of sustainable sanitation for a healthy and stable society. ‘Safe toilets for all by 2030’ is one of the targets of Sustainable Development Goal 6 – but the world is seriously off track.
When people can't use a toilet, they often defecate outside, a practice known as open defecation. This affects at least 419 million people globally and leads to the spread of diseases like diarrhoea. Diarrhea is a major cause of death in children, with about 1,000 dying daily due to poor sanitation and dirty water. By improving sanitation and access to clean water, over 300,000 children's lives could be saved each year.
History:
In 2001, the World Toilet organization, established by Jack Sim in Singapore, chose November 19 as World Toilet Day to make toilets more relatable and understandable to the public. The NGO aimed to highlight the importance of toilets and gained support from the Sustainable Sanitation Alliance in 2007. This day became widely recognized as World Toilet Day in 2010, following the United Nations' acknowledgement of the right to water and sanitation as a fundamental human right.
Key messages on World Toilet Day 2024: (United Nations)
- Toilets are a place for peace: This essential space, at the centre of our lives, should be safe and secure. But for billions of people, sanitation is under threat from conflict, climate change, disasters and neglect.
- Toilets are a place for protection: By creating a barrier between us and our waste, sanitation services are essential for public and environmental health. But when toilet systems are inadequate, damaged or broken, pollution spreads and deadly diseases get unleashed.
- Toilets are a place for progress: Sanitation is a human right. It protects everyone’s dignity and especially transforms the lives of women and girls. More investment and better governance of sanitation are critical for a fairer, more peaceful world.
India’s toilet revolution: Swachh Bharat Mission
In India, unsafe toilets caused more than 20% of diseases and 500 children daily died from related illnesses, but in 2019, Rural India was declared free of open defecation after the Swachh Bharat Mission began in 2014. The Indus Valley Civilization was known for its advanced toilets and sewage systems, with Harappa and Mohenjo Daro having complex drainage.
Despite this history, India started with rudimentary toilets in 2500 BC. Factors like population growth and poverty in rural areas made sanitation a lower priority, but a report in 1859 led to public health commissions and later the sanitation police under the Military Cantonment Act of 1865. Despite these efforts, changing people's habits on where and how to defecate remained a challenge.
The Growth of Healthcare and Sanitation System in India:
- Legislation for sanitation in independent India:
Independent India needed changes in many areas since every field was in poor condition. Therefore, the Nehru government's initial five-year plan from 1951-1956 focused on improving public health. In 1954, it started the first Rural Sanitation Programme.
- Central Rural Sanitation Programme 1986:
To improve sanitation, the seventh five-year plan planned to give 25% of rural homes access to clean toilets.
- Total Sanitation Campaign 1999:
This campaign aimed to raise awareness about using toilets and building proper toilet facilities. By 2007, after the campaign, about 3.5 million rural Indian homes had their toilets. A survey mentioned that over 1,700 places where women live and 41,000 toilets in schools were constructed, along with rural shops for cleanliness, costing nearly 2.92 billion rupees.
- Nirmal Gram Puraskar 2003
In 2003, the government started the National Clean Village Award to motivate communities to help with sanitation. Winners are honored by the Indian president every year.
- National Urban Sanitation Policy, 2008
The government realized many challenges existed. They decided to concentrate on cities and towns to ensure everyone had access to good health and environmental services.
- Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan, 2012
The government was still far from reaching its goal of becoming ODF. To fully achieve ODF and make local groups the main focus, the TSC was restarted as Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan. Its goal was to provide safe sanitation in rural areas by 2015.
- Swachh Bharat Abhiyan 2014
In 2014, the Indian government started the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (Clean India) campaign on October 2, aiming to end open defecation and manual scavenging in five years. This initiative is the most comprehensive and largest sanitation program to date.
Key Facts:
- 3.5 billion people continue to live without basic sanitation, including 419 million who practice open defecation.
- 2.2 billion people continue to live without clean drinking water, including 115 million who drink surface water.
- 2 billion people still lack basic hygiene services, with 653 million having no access at all.
- Every day, around 1,000 children under the age of five die as a result of unsafe water, sanitation, and hygiene conditions.
- Ensuring better access to water, sanitation, and hygiene can save 1.4 million lives each year.
- The World Health Assembly, the organization's top decision-making body, has recognized climate change as an impending threat to world health.
- Globally, an estimated 2 billion people live in unstable or conflict-affected areas.
- Children in fragile contexts are three times more likely to practice open defecation, four times more likely to lack basic sanitation services, and eight times more likely to lack basic drinking water services.
- Children under 15 living in conflict-affected countries are nearly three times more likely to die from diarrhoeal diseases due to a lack of safe water, sanitation, and hygiene than from direct violence.
- Water-related disasters have made the list of disasters for the past 50 years, accounting for 70% of all deaths from natural disasters.
- Every dollar spent on disaster-resistant infrastructure saves four dollars in reconstruction costs.
- 42% of home wastewater is not properly treated, which harms ecosystems and human health.
- Only 11% of the estimated total home and industrial wastewater production is now reused.
