Health Challenges of the Decade by WHO- #13 Water, Sanitation & Hygiene

When it comes to talking about improving basic health care facilities, urgent action is needed to improve water, sanitation and hygiene as well as health care waste management and environmental cleaning.

One in four health care facilities globally lacked basic water services, and one in eight had no sanitation service, as found by the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme 2019 Global Baseline Report. In addition, many health care facilities lacked basic facilities related to hand hygiene and safe segregation and disposal of health care waste.

Some of the fundamental facilities for the provision of quality, people-centered care are water, sanitation, hygiene, waste management and environmental cleaning (WASH) services in health care facilities. Such services also reduce health care associated infections and diseases, chemical hazards and risks to the community. They also build trust and increase the uptake of health services, improve efficiency and reduce cost of service delivery and improve staff morale. With uneven large gaps in current WASH services in health care facilities, WHO, in collaboration with UNICEF and partners around the world, is working hard to improve WASH in health care facilities, including the safe management of health care waste.

Ensuring health care facilities are clean and sterile 

Clean water and sanitation are key factors to keeping health care facilities sterile. Currently, about one in four health facilities worldwide lack basic water and sanitation services, increasing the overall risk of both chronic and acute infection for patients and health care professionals alike. The lack of these basics in health facilities stand a chance which could lead to poor-quality care and an increased chance of infection for patients and health workers.

Keeping Health Care Clean

Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services are critical to maintain a robust health system, and an environment devoid of these necessities yields poor-quality care and an increased rate of infections. Many communities around the world are living with unsafe drinking water and substandard sanitation services – both of which can cause disease. WHO claimed that along with its partners, they are currently working with 35 low and middle-income countries to improve the water, sanitation and hygiene conditions in their health facilities.

The organization added that the global goal is for all countries to have included WASH services in plans, budgets and implementation efforts by 2023, and by 2030 all health care facilities globally should have basic WASH services.

Over to you

An unsanitary healthcare environment can be a big setback for healthcare industry. This series of health challenge of the decade majorly aims at implementing several actions to tackle healthcare-associated infections in a more improvised way throughout the world, regardless of the level of development of healthcare systems and to improve the availability of resources.