Schools, communities helped to treat water-Water Day Supplement

By Joyce Nyakato

3RS secondary school is located miles off the Jinja highway. Despite a small population of just 300 students, the school always found it hard to boil water.“In the past we used to try and boil water for the students but it wasn’t enough,” admits Steven Turyahabwa, the school patron for the ‘water champions’, a club promoting water and sanitation in the school. In the morning, a boda boda cyclist is sent to a well three miles away to pick five jerrycans of water. The water is boiled along with the one that is used to prepare posho for lunch and it takes a long time to cool.

Consequences
Using this method alone, sh100,000 has been spent on fuel every term and a lot of time has been invested in preparing the water. On a day when there has been a delay inorder to prepare food in time, safe drinking water has to be sacrificed so that children can eat on time.

When students are very thirsty, they drink contaminated water, thereby compromising their health. Allan Nakibinge, a student of the school reckons that the people in his neighbouring community do not boil their water either. They assume that because water is from the well, it is safe to drink. Similarly, in Mubanda S.S, another school in Mukono district has been a perennial lack of safe drinking water. According to Alex Ibanda, the patron of the water club, students used to take a personal effort to boil their own water for consumption.

Solution
However, with the availability of aquasafe tablets and tanks for storage of drinking water that have been distributed in the school, all the problems have been solved. The schools are happy with the water points because they have saved the trouble of having to boil drinking water for their students. Children spend less time looking for water because the water points have been brought closer to them.

World Water Day is a day to draw focus on the importance of fresh water and advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater resources. Access to safe drinking water and good sanitation are crucial to the health of a population and this remains a big challenge in Uganda. According to the Uganda Health demographic survey, 2006, only 44% of households have access to safe clean water, a situation that further worsens in rural and other drier areas of the country.

Why safe water?
However, the most at risk of unsafe drinking water are children below the age of five years who are more prone to developing diarrhea. Diarrhea continues to be the third killer disease that claims the lives of children five years and below in Uganda. According to the Water and Sanitation Sector Performance Report (2004), it accounts for approximately 17% of infant mortality in Uganda. To rise to the challenge of unsafe drinking water in Uganda, UHMG/AFFORD is involved in water and sanitation programming through a behavioral change process to promote water treatment practices using chlorine-based tablets (Aquasafe).

Water treatment
Aquasafe is a tablet that contains chlorine used for treating and killing germs that cause water borne diseases like diarrhea. It has been internationally approved by health authorities like World Health Organisation as safe for consumption. “This tablet dissolves on its own and therefore does not need to be crushed or shaken in water,” explains Emily Katarikawe, the UHMG managing director. Interestingly, chlorine is the chemical used to treat and purify water from the National Water treatment plant and this is the water that comes through our taps.

However, this water becomes contaminated as it is pumped to our homes due to weak infrastructure and thus contamination. The tablet takes 30 minutes to dissolve, thereby decreasing chances of contamination during this period as the tablet is active for this long to eliminate germs. With the escalating prices of fuel and the fact that boiling is not always an effective means of making water safe, the use of chlorine based products comes in handy.

Way forward
In addition, there has been more awareness highlighting the importance of safe drinking water and proper sanitation. To date, over 15 million water treatment tablets have been sold or distributed, translating to at least 300 million litres of safe treated water being consumed by the general populace.

According to Katarikawe, the promotion of safe water, through aquasafe, has been emphasised at households to prevent water borne diseases, especially diarrhoea. UHMG’s approach to promoting water treatment practices includes community engagements through inter-personal community activations with local leaders, village health teams, corporate social responsibility activities and use of education materials and media.

The response of aqua safe in schools has been overwhelming because they found boiling for a large number of students cumbersome. Placing a tablet of sh50 in water to keep it safe saves money that would be used on firewood and the time that it would take for the water to cool and make it consumable. Children have taken part in the treatment process.

The programme in schools has also led to either the formation or revival of the water clubs, which participate in promotion of safe water in the communities. 3RS secondary school participates in cleaning the community wells every term, in the neighbouring village of Koba in Buikwe district to reduce on the level of water contamination at the three nearby water collection points.

Whereas there are a number of players in the area of sanitation and hygiene, there are major gaps in the promotion and provision of safe drinking water, especially in the water borne disease prone areas. Behavioral change towards treatment of water before drinking is still low. In schools where the tablet was first introduced, children first resented it, but then welcomed the idea after getting used to treated water.