Clean & water is vital for public health.

Improved water supply and sanitation will benefit the local communities while better management of water resources, can boost countries’ economic growth resulting in poverty reduction.

The human right to water and sanitation has been recognized since 2010 by the UN General Assembly. Everyone has the right to sufficient, continuous, safe, acceptable, physically accessible, and affordable water for personal and domestic use.

Drinking water services

Drinking water from an improved water source that is located on-premises, available when needed, and free from faecal and priority chemical contamination is not a luxury.

Sociocultural and economic inequalities persist, mainly between rural and urban citizens but also in towns and cities where people living in low-income, informal, or illegal settlements tend to have less access to improved sources of drinking water compared to other residents.

Water and health

Poor sanitation and access to contaminated water bursts transmission of diseases such as cholera, diarrhoea, dysentery, hepatitis A, typhoid, and polio. Inappropriate water and sanitation services expose individuals to health risks that could otherwise be prevented. Poor conditions in health care facilities where both patients and staff lack water, sanitation, and hygiene services places them at an additional risk of infection and disease.

Globally, 15% of patients develop an infection during a hospital stay, with the proportion much greater in low-income countries.