WHO and UNICEF report says over 800 million children aren’t able to wash hands at school

According to a joint report by the World Health Organization and United Nations Children’s Fund, released on August 12, more than 800 million children globally are not able to wash their hands at school. The world is steadily coming out of lockdowns, invoked to stop the spread of the contagious virus. In this step of unlocking there are guidelines for reopening schools during the pandemic, which emphasis on hygiene and cleanliness to reduce transmission of the virus and recommend schools to enforce regular hand washing, among other precautionary measures.

The report from two top bodies said: “However, in the 60 countries identified as having the highest risk of health and humanitarian crisis due to Covid-19, one in two schools lacked basic water and sanitation services and three in four lacked basic handwashing services at the start of the pandemic.”

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The report reveals there are 818 million children all around the world, who do not have access to basic handwashing at school premises. Out of these 818 million children, only 355 million children mainly from Northern Africa and Western Asia have the availability of water, but not soap. The remaining 462 million have no access to both water and soap for handwashing.

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Worst condition in the sub-Saharan region 

Condition of sub-Saharan Africa is worst, according to report and over half of the children live without access to handwashing in this region. The report also throws light on access to drinking water in schools, as per report 70% of schools have basic drinking water services, but there are still 584 million children globally without access to basic drinking water at school. Many lived in sub-Saharan Africa, and three countries in particular: Ethiopia, Nigeria, and the Democratic Republic of Congo face this problem worst. Nearly 700 million children lack basic sanitation at school, and 20%, or over 350 million schools, have no sanitation service at all, said report.

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