Travel and Toilets

Our Sri Lanka service team traveled over 1100 miles throughout the country as we served alongside our partners United Christian Fellowship. You can only imagine that with that much travel bathroom breaks were frequent. However, many communities in Sri Lanka lack access to toilets, creating health and safety issues in affected communities.

One area where we served had one pit latrine that serves approximately 65 people. Where there is a lack of access to this basic human need, health and well-being of community members, especially girls and women, is negatively impacted.

In fact:

• 2.4 billion People live without improved sanitation (World Health Organization (WHO)/UNICEF 2015).
• One in ten people has no choice but to defecate in the open (WHO/UNICEF 2015).
• Diarrhea caused by poor sanitation and unsafe water kills 315,000 children every year (WAS-Hwatch 2016).
• Disease transmission at work mostly caused by poor sanitation and hygiene practices, causes 17% of all workplace deaths (International Labour Organization (ILO) 2003).
• Loss of productivity due to illnesses caused by lack of sanitation and poor hygiene practices is estimated to cost many countries up to 5% of GDP (Hutton 2012)

Our organization is working to change these statistics one toilet at a time!

We sponsored the building of a safe and clean toilet facility in the community of Bendiwewa, Sri Lanka this past year. We visited the community to see the finished toilet last week.

We hope that this facility is the first of many that we will provide for vulnerable communities. The facts show that something as basic as a toilet can transform lives. This human right restores dignity to all and helps to protect girls and women from disease and assault. Toilets also advance education and business by decreasing illness related to a lack of proper sanitation.

Give thanks for the toilet that you have and join us in creating positive world change!

If you’re interested in supporting our efforts to bring well-being and dignity to vulnerable communities we’d love to hear from you!

For more about the benefits of having a proper toilet check out:

http://www.un.org/en/events/toiletday/assets/img/posters/fact_sheet_toiletsandjobs_EN_3.pdf