Over a Billion Women Lack Safe Sanitation

Joe DeCapua – Voice of America – Monday, 19 November 2012

Aminata Rabo, of Burkina Faso, lost a son to chronic diarrhea and a daughter to malaria. Image: Water Aid

November 19th is World Toilet Day. It’s estimated that more than a billion women lack access to safe sanitation. The NGO WaterAid says a lack of adequate toilets puts women at risk of shame, disease, harassment and even violence.

WaterAid Chief Executive Barbara Frost said governments need to invest a lot more in sanitation to improve women’s health and livelihoods.

“On World Toilet Day, the message that WaterAid is putting out is that one in three women still don’t have a decent toilet. And what that means is that they have to wait until it’s after dark to go out and find a safe place to relieve themselves – a threat to their health, to their security, to their safety,” she said . . .

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