SANITATION PRACTICE AND IMPLICATIONS ON STUDENTS HEALTH IN ENUGU STATE COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND
Sanitation can be seen as the policy and practice of protecting health through hygienic measures. In the view of the World Health Organization (WHO) (2007), sanitation generally refers to the provision of facilities and services for the safe disposal of human urine and faeces. It has been realized that improving sanitation is known to have a significant impact on health both in households and across communities (WHO, 2007). Similarly, Iheke (2010), sees sanitation as the process of keeping places clean and hygienic especially by providing a sewage system and a clean water supply. Sanitation refers to all conditions that affects the health of people in a geographical area. The word sanitation operationally refers to the maintenance of hygiene conditions, through services such as garbage collection and waste water disposal so as not to endanger the health and welfare of people and also for the social and environmental effects, it may have on people. Throughout the world, an estimated 2.5 billion people lack basic sanitation (morethan 35% of the world’s population) (World Health Organization & UNICEF, 2012) Basic sanitation is described as having access to facilities for the safe disposal of human waste (faeces and urine), as well as having the ability to maintain hygienic conditions, through services such as garbage collection, industrial/hazardous waste management, and wastewater treatment and disposal.(World Health Organization & UNICEF, 2012).According to WHO and UNICEF (2012), without immediate acceleration in progress, the world will not achieve the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal (MDG) sanitation target (i.e., to halve the proportion of people without sustainable access to basic sanitation by 2015). Basic Sanitation is very important in all places and environments especially schools. School sanitation refers to hygienic practices that occur in schools. Coppens (2005) consider School Sanitation and Hygiene Education as the combination of hardware and software components that are necessary to produce a healthy school environment to develop or support safe hygiene behaviour. The author is of the view that hardware components include supply of drinking water and facilities for hand washing and safe disposal of excreta and solid waste in and around the school compound.
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