Safe Sanitation: A Global Imperative
Safe sanitation is essential to human health and dignity. In every community, a toilet protects people from disease, safeguards our habitat, and underpins social and economic advancement.
Yet today, 3.4 billion people still live without a safe toilet. Each year,1.4 million people die due to inadequate access to water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). Diarrhoeal disease accounts for over two-thirds of teh total WASH-attributable burden, with over one million deaths. And every day, around 1000 children under five die from diseases linked to unsafe WASH [1]. This is a preventable tragedy – and a solvable one.
Climate change is exacerbating this crisis. Floods and droughts damage sanitation systems, contaminate water sources, and disrupt access, disproportionately impacting the most vulnerable. Building resilient WASH services is therefore a critical public health priority and a vital adaptation strategy.
We certainly know what works: lasting public investment, strong and accountable management, and reliable data. These are key to expanding access, improving quality, and saving lives. Crucially, health systems - particularly health facilities - must have safe water, sanitation, and hygiene to protect patients and health workers, and to combat infections, sepsis, and antimicrobial resistance.
Sanitation is a human right. Ensuring toilets are resilient, accessible, and affordable for everyone - women and men, children, people with disabilities, and those in fragile contexts – is not just sound policy, it’s a moral imperative.Countries that prioritize long-term planning, cross-sector collaboration, and accountability will reap profound health, economic, and equity benefits.
This World Toilet Day, let us commit to accelerating progress. Let’s invest in toilets fit for the future and ensure safe sanitation for every person, in every place. Together, we can prevent disease, protect our planet, and promote dignity for all.
- Dr Rüdiger Krech,Director a.i., Department of Environment, Climate Change, One Health & migration, World Health Organization
[1] Burden of disease attributable to unsafe drinking-water, sanitation and hygiene, 2019 update. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2023. License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.
Key changes made & why:
* Stronger opening: More directly states the importance of sanitation.
* “Exacerbating” instead of “Intensifying”: Slightly more impactful and common phrasing in this context.
* “Critical” instead of “Public-health”: Emphasizes the urgency.
* “Must” instead of “have to”: stronger and more direct language.
* Rephrased for flow: Minor adjustments to sentence structure for better readability.
* Emphasis on “must”: Italics added to highlight the critical need for WASH in health facilities.
* Minor word choices: Swapped a few words for slightly more impactful alternatives (e.g., ”contexts” rather of “settings”).
* Formatting: maintained the original formatting for consistency.
The goal was to refine the language for greater impact and clarity while preserving the original message and tone.
