ILOILO – Not all households in this province have sanitary toilets. Many poor families do not have the means to secure one thus discouraging people from the unhygienic practice of relieving themselves just anywhere is an enormous challenge.
It is difficult, said Dr. Patricia Grace Trabado, Provincial Health Office (PHO) chief.
PHO started the campaign to eliminate the unhealthy exercise of open defecation in the barangay and municipal level in 2015. So far, of the 1,721 barangays in this province 751 achieved “zero open defecation” status.
Residents of these villages all use sanitary toilets, according to Trabado.
Nine municipalities also achieved a similar status. PHO identified them as Banate, Bingawan, Igbaras, Miag-ao, Mina, New Lucena, Oton, San Miguel, and San Rafael.
But there are 42 towns and one component city in this province. In fact, said Trabado, the nine towns and 751 villages that achieved “zero open defecation” status merely hurdled “level 1” (residents sharing sanitary toilets) of the campaign.
PHO has set a higher goal – level 2, or ensuring that each household has its own sanitary toilets.
This is the most ideal, said Trabado, to avert environmental contamination and water-borne diseases.
PHO has an evaluation team checking villages. It is made up of municipal health officers, the Sangguniang Bayan member who chairs the committee on health and sanitation, municipal nurses, and representatives from PHO and the Department of Health.
According to Trabado, PHO’s goal is for 50 percent of Iloilo towns to achieve zero open defecation status by the end of this year.
She urged local government units to at least put up accessible public sanitary toilets.
PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), approximately seven million Filipinos still practice open defecation, mostly in rural areas.
“When our neighbors defecate in the open, in fields and waterways, our children will more likely experience frequent bouts of diarrhea, have worm infections, and grow up stunted and undernourished,” said UNICEF country representative Lotta Sylwander.
Thus, the DOH continues to promote the Zero Open Defecation Program (ZODP) advocacy and health education campaign. The ZODP utilizes the approaches and strategies of Community-Led Total Sanitation or CLTS.
CLTS is under the umbrella concept of total sanitation that includes a range of behaviors such as:
* stopping open defecation practices
* ensuring that everyone uses a sanitary toilet
* frequent and proper hand washing
* hygienic handling food and water
* safe disposal of animal and domestic waste
* creation and maintenance of a clean and safe environment
The DOH, through the National Sustainable Sanitation Plan (NSSP), has set an ambitious target that by 2022, all barangays that are practicing open defecation shall be declared Zero Open Defecation (ZOD) status.
“But giving away toilets alone will not solve our problem,” said Health secretary Francisco Duque.
Households and communities need to be prepared, he stressed.
“They should also be responsible. When our governors and mayors give toilets for free, household heads should also invest their time and resources, however limited they may be, in building their own toilet facilities,” said Duque.
Moving beyond the eradication of open defecation towards the safe management of sanitation for all requires a continuous shift in the types of approaches, he stressed – a shift from eradicating open defecation, to shared or basic sanitation, to safely managed systems for all will need to be accompanied by a shift in approaches from collective behavior change, towards strengthening supply chains and improving public services.
Across all of these steps there is a need for the public regulation of the compliance of behavior, infrastructure and services of individuals, collectives and corporations in order to protect the safety of all concerned, said Duque. (With a report from the Department of Health/PN)
