Webinar 3: WHO Guidelines on Sanitation and Health

This Event is now completed

Date: 04th July 2019

Proposed time: 16:00 hrs to 17:00 hrs (IST) 

Every year around 827,000 people in low- and middle-income countries die as a result of inadequate water, sanitation, and hygiene. Poor sanitation is believed to be the main cause in 50% of these deaths and is a major factor in several neglected tropical diseases, including intestinal worms, schistosomiasis, and trachoma. Poor sanitation also contributes to malnutrition. 

Taking a review on the situation, the UN General Assembly in 2010 recognized access to safe and clean drinking water and sanitation as a human right, and called for international efforts to help countries to provide safe, clean, accessible and affordable drinking water and sanitation.  Also, the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG), target 6.2 calls for adequate and equitable sanitation for all. The target is tracked with the indicator of “safely managed sanitation services”.  

As the international authority on public health, World Health Organisation (WHO) has been instrumental in promoting effective risk assessment and management practices for sanitation in communities and health facilities through the WHO Guidelines on Sanitation and Health, Safe Use of Wastewater, Recreational Water Quality and promotion of Sanitation Safety Planning. Understanding the need to highlight the linkages between health and sanitation, the School of Water and Waste, AAETI, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE)in partnership with WHO is organizing its third in a series of webinar events on the recently released WHO Guidelines on Sanitation and Health. 

Aim and Scope of the Guidelines: Provide evidence on the effectiveness of a range of sanitation interventions and provide a comprehensive framework for health-protecting sanitation, covering policy and governance measures, implementation of sanitation technologies, systems and behavioural interventions, risk-based management, and monitoring approaches.Critically, the guidelines articulate the role of the health sector in maximizing the health impact of sanitation interventions. The guidelines also identify gaps in the evidence-base to guide future research efforts to improve the effectiveness of sanitation interventions.

Target Groups: Practitioners working in Water, Sanitation and WASH sector.