If India remains committed to achieving 100 percent coverage in terms of safe sanitation services by October 2019, as many as 3,00,000 deaths caused due to diarrheal disease and protein-energy malnutrition (PEM) since the country launched the Swachh Bharat Mission in 2014 can be averted, the World Health Organisation highlighted.
Through this scheme, the government aims to make India open defecation free by October 2019, and the latest data show that, so far, 69.4% of the target has been achieved. WHO said that this initiative could be remarkable as before 2019 unsafe sanitation caused an estimated 199 million cases of diarrhoea annually.
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The study, which was released at the ‘Dissemination Workshop’ here, found evidence of improvement in drinking water supply, sanitation services and personal hygiene which had positive health impacts.
“It is estimated that SBM-G will result in averting more than 0.3 deaths (diarrhoea and protein-energy malnutrition) between 2014 and October 2019,” WHO expert Richard Johnston said.
The numbers and the study itself is significant especially because unsafe sanitation before 2014 reportedly caused 199 million cases of diarrhoea each year. The study also takes note that a fair distance has been travelled by India since 2014 with household sanitation coverage jumping by over 13 per cent annually between the years 2016 and 2018.
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