UN-HABITAT twenty first session of the Governing Council, 16-20 April 2007, Nairobi, Kenya: slums, inadequate sanitation and the silent tsunami

Sanitation and health are interlinked. As many as 1.6 million people die annually as a result of poor sanitation and hygiene - a number 5 times greater than the deaths in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. The absence of decent toilets in poor neighbourhoods violates a person’s right to privacy and is an affront to his or her dignity yet more than 25% of city dwellers (2.6 billion) suffer this condition. In 2002, nearly half the developing world (2.5 billion) had no access to proper sanitation - Asia (1.98 billion), Africa (470 million), Latin America and the Caribbean (130 million). In the Mbare neighbourhood of Zimbabwe’s Harare, up to 1,300 people share one communal toilet with only 6 squatting holes. In Nepal, two-thirds of the population defecates in the open because they consider their existing latrines to be unsanitary and unsafe. Women bear the brunt of the consequences of inadequate sanitation, but this has not been a development priority on the UN agenda.