World Health Organization and UNICEF conducted their “first ever global assessment of water and sanitation in schools”, and the results are quite depressing. It seems like India is not the only country where children, especially girls are devoid of proper sanitation and hygienic drinking water at schools.
We all know the circumstances in which children often find it better to drop out and stay at home instead of attending schools. Among these circumstances, unavailability of sanitation and water is a leading one. The report of WHO and UNICEF shows that South Asia is nowhere near in achieving the sustainable development goal of giving access of sanitation and clean water to everyone till 2030.
The statistics, as reported by The Telegraph, demand immediate action by the authorities:
• Around 600-900 million of children don’t have any facility of washing hands or proper sanitation at school.
• Around 47 percent of schools in the world do not provide soap for children.
• Unavailability of separate washrooms for girls and boys is also a major concern in many parts of the world.
• Nursery and primary schools even don’t provide drinking water to children. The number is not great in secondary schools too.
• Girls in several regions miss school for some days every month because there is no facility of washing hands after changing sanitary pads at school.
• Not having separate toilets also restricts them to attend school when girls are on periods.
• Diarrhea caused by dirty water and poor toilets kills a child under the age of five every two minutes.
These points very clearly display the hurdles world is facing in the way of education for all. Children’s, and especially girls’ educational development is at risk not only in India, but everywhere. Schools need to upgrade their infrastructure, and provide for the basic necessities of a child, like drinking water which half of the population of children have to carry from their homes.
Boys still manage to keep up with the circumstances during the school hours, but for girls this can be a nightmare at least once a month, if not every day.
