Why does SSHE really matter?

Globally some 1.1 billion people are currently without access to improved water supply and about 2.4 billion don't benefit from any form of improved sanitation services (WHO, 2000). The majority of these people live in Asia and Africa. In Africa, for example, two out of five people lack improved water supply.

The provision of safe water and sanitation facilities in schools is a first step towards a healthy physical learning environment, benefiting both learning and health (Ad 1). However, the mere provision of facilities does not necessarily make them sustainable or produce the desired impact. It is the use of latrines and the related appropriate hygiene behaviour of people that provides health benefits. In schools, hygiene education aims to promote those practices that will help to prevent water and sanitation-related diseases as well as encouraging healthy behaviour in the future generation of adults (Burgers, 2000). As reflected in table 1, water-related diseases caused an estimated 3.4 million deaths in 1998 alone.

Table 1: Number of estimated deaths from water-related diseases (1998)

The combination of adequate facilities, correct behavioural practices and education is meant to have a positive impact on the health and hygiene conditions of the community as a whole, both now and in the future. The success of a school hygiene programme is therefore not determined only by the number of latrines constructed and the number of handpumps installed or water connections built. Nor is the success of a programme determined simply by what children know. Knowledge that is not applied to hygiene behaviour in practice has no impact on health.

School sanitation and hygiene education (SSHE) in this paper therefore refers to the combination of hardware and software components that are necessary to produce a healthy school environment and develop or support safe hygiene behaviour. The hardware components include supply of drinking water and facilities for hand washing and safe disposal of excreta and solid waste in and around the school compound. The software components are the activities that promote conditions at school and practices of school staff and children that help to prevent water and sanitation-related diseases and parasites (UNICEF and IRC, 1998).

Ad 1: Primary schools in some of the poorest countries have inadequate sanitation facilities, according to a pilot survey of 14 countries in 1995. The average number of users is often higher than 50 students per toilet in city schools. None of the 14 countries had increased the number of school toilets by more than 8% since 1990, suggesting that they are barely managing to keep up with the rise in student populations. Somewhat better progress had been achieved in providing safe water in schools. Inadequate sanitation and water in schools jeopardize not only students' health but also their attendance. Girls in particular are likely to be kept out of school if there are no sanitation facilities (UNICEF, Progress of Nations 1997, p. 13).