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Opinion
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| Importance of hand hygiene to prevent the spread of disease | | | | Growing up in a clean and safe environment is every child’s right. Access to clean water, basic toilets, and good hygiene practices not only keeps children thriving, but also gives them a healthier start in life. Despite COVID-19 putting the spotlight on the importance of hand hygiene to prevent the spread of disease, three billion people worldwide, including hundreds of millions of school-going children, do not have access to hand washing facilities with soap. People living in rural areas, urban slums, disaster-prone areas and low-income countries are the most vulnerable and the most affected.
The consequences of unsafe water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) on children can be deadly. Over 700 children under age 5 die every day of diarrhoeal diseases due to lack of appropriate WASH services. In areas of conflict, children are nearly 20 times more likely to die from diarrhoeal disease than from the conflict itself.
UNICEF promotes community-based handwashing through a variety of media and through campaigns like Global Handwashing Day, which reaches hundreds of millions of people every year. Our people-based approach has helped entire communities eliminate the dangerous practice of open defecation, many of whom reached Open Defecation Free status in 2019.
We work directly with schools and health-care facilities to improve access to basic water, sanitation and handwashing facilities, and to establish protocols for preventing and controlling infections. We support menstrual health and hygiene in schools by constructing private, secure sanitation and washing facilities as well as menstrual pad disposal facilities. We also provide education and support services that help more girls better manage their menstruation cycle.
A significant amount of our work occurs in fragile and emergency settings to help prepare for and respond to humanitarian emergencies. This includes transporting water, ensuring it is purified, and constructing toilets in refugee camps and transit centres. We work to construct water and sanitation facilities that outlast the emergency, while providing clear leadership and accountability in humanitarian response.
We are committed to making all WASH programmes sustainable and adaptive to climate change by the end of 2021. In addition to supporting child-inclusive programmes, in 2019, UNICEF constructed and rehabilitated over 1,000 solar-powered water systems to address increasing water scarcity.
We work in close collaboration with governments, the private sector, academia, civil society organizations, and communities to improve systems and practices that fulfil a child's right to water and sanitation.
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