According to reports, Nigeria is one of the world’s five biggest contributors to the problem of open defecation and Ebonyi State has a shocking rate of 45.5% among the states that contribute to this poor sanitation challenge. It is against this backdrop that the Ebonyi State lawmakers passed a law against open defecation, to help mitigate the effect of open defecation and bring about behavioral change. Contributing to Goal 6 of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and the President’s speech on 12th June, 2020, PDA decided to train and educate communities on Community Led-Total Sanitation (CLTS).
Ebonyi state comes last in the states in Nigeria with basic sanitation services and 1.6 million Ebonyians practices open defecation. The highest in the South East, occupying 33 position out of 35 states and FCT in Nigeria. Sadly, only 25% of Ebonyians use improved sanitation facilities and only 5% use safely managed sanitation facilities. In addition, only 5% of Ebonyians have handwashing facilities on premises with water and soap. (Factsheet from UNICEF; NBS).
Training Amangbala community in Afikpo North of Ebonyi State, the participants pledged that CLTS will be upheld in their community. Triggering disgust among the participants using faeses-stimulating substances, the participants were taken down memory lane on how one gram of faeces contains up to 10,000,000 viruses and 1,000,000 bacteria. The participants also understood that faesces could contain 1,000 parasite cyst and 100 parasite eggs and pathogen. There was a demonstration on how flies and other objects can contaminate food or fluid if it touches the faeses left on open surface; thereby causing diseases. The demonstration actually triggered disgust and the participants saw the need of total sanitation and hygiene improvement.
From the assessment and training it was very clear that most households do not have toilet facilities in their homes and those that have do not understand that even water closet toilets should be closed after use. As a result of lack of toilets in some homes, faeces are dropped at liberty around nearby bushes and in some cases around the homes in the night. The participants noted that the community people use communal toilets and, in a bid, not to get contaminated people prefer using open hideouts.
Among the women that contributed, Mrs. Philomena Ekuma said that the major defaulters are the Okada people and young women of reproductive ages. According to her, she stated that Okada people always look for any available nearby bush to defecate. For the young women of childbearing age, they leave the faeces of their children on the open surface not minding whether it brings disgust to their neighbors or not. Mrs. Orie Eze said that even when the young ladies are called to order, they look down on anyone that talks to them without paying attention to what is said. Today, we have all lost the sense of hygiene in the society she concluded.
Health Implications of open defecation.
The effect of open defecation can be disastrous if overlooked. According to World Bank, around 122,000 Nigerians (including 87,000 children under 5) die each year from diarrhea. Again, from the report we understand that water, sanitation and hygiene are directly responsible for nearly 90% of these deaths.
Call to Action
It is highly unlikely that the new Global target of universal coverage will be reached. Based on this, PDA and the communities call on political leadership at all levels – household, community, LGA and state level – to prioritize public health and hygiene policies to attain an open-defecation-free states and nation.