A recent report by the World Health Organization (WHO) has praised Indias's Swachh Bharat Mission.
What are the highlights?
The WHO statement was based on the initial results of a WHO modelling study on the health impact of the Swachh Bharat Mission Gramin (SBM-G).
WHO lauds India’s commitment to accelerated coverage of safe sanitation services.
It said India could avert 3 lakh deaths provided there is 100% implementation of Swachh Bharat Mission.
This is in reference to deaths due to diarrhoeal disease and protein-energy malnutrition (PEM).
The WHO analysed India’s accelerated coverage of safe sanitation services by accumulative Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs).
DALYs is the sum of the years of life lost due to premature mortality and years lost due to disability or ill-health.
According to the calculations, if all sanitation services are used, the initiative could result in over 14 million more years of healthy life in the period measured.
However, most of the WHO statement talks about the benefits of the sanitation programme in the future tense.
What is the actual status of Swachh Bharat mission?
According to official sources the household latrine coverage figure for 2018-19 stands at around 90% across the country.
In Odisha it is nearly 60%, in Bihar 63%, in Goa 76%, in Tripura 77%, and in Jharkhand 85%.
On the other hand, states like Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Arunachal Pradesh have 100% coverage.
Household sanitation coverage has increased from an estimated 2% per year before Swachh Bharat to more than 13% annually between 2016 and 2018.
What are the positive health impacts?
Swachh Bharat Mission led to additional health gains through changes -
in personal hygiene (e.g., handwashing behaviour)
in consumption of safe drinking water (e.g., reduced risk of faecal contamination of drinking water)
There is evidence that improvements in drinking water supply, sanitation services and personal hygiene have positive health impacts.
They include
improved nutritional status and its benefits
reduced incidence of infectious diseases such as different neglected tropical diseases and acute respiratory infections
