Lack of clean water and stunted growth

Poor access to clean water and good sanitation is associated with poor growth in children. Among children living in a poor community, those who had the poorest access to clean water and sanitation were 1 cm shorter and had 54 percent more episodes of diarrhoea than children who grew up in the cleaner conditions.According to researchers of Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, USA, the condition that cause early childhood stunting may have long-term effects on children's lives. Nearly 3 billion people currently live without adequate access to clean water and another 4.2 billion have no sanitation. During the study, researchers followed 230 children, who lived in a community in Lima, from birth to age 35 months. The researchers noted the quality of their water and sanitation, height and frequency of diarrhoea. The families included in the study obtained their water from indoor tap, a cistern truck or community standpipe, or bought it from a neighbour. Water was stored in containers ranging from small pots and pans to large covered cement cisterns.Although water stored in small containers is recycled more often than water stored in larger vessels, small pots are usually kept indoors and uncovered, making them more at risk of contamination than are large containers, which are generally kept outside and covered. Children living in houses with the worst access to clean water and sanitation, which included houses that lacked indoor taps and plumbing, and stored water in small containers, were shorter and had more episodes of diarrhoea by age 24 months than children raised in the cleaner conditions.

Simply improving water quality did not change children's height; children raised in households with an indoor water source but no sewage or large storage containers remained significantly shorter than others. Stunting is a sign of malnutrition, which may result if drinking unclean water transmits diseases that use up the body's resources that are normally used for brain and body development. The solution may also involve educating people about safe practices, such as opting for larger water storage containers that are kept outside.Early childhood hygiene could have effects on the brainpower of the future adult population, and the productivity of the nations in which they reside. Providing the world's population with access to clean water and good sanitation remains a huge public health challenge, and will remain so unless governments make it a top priority. Given the scope of the problem, the government must not delay investing in measures known to alleviate the devastating long-term societal costs of inadequate water, poor sanitation, and early childhood diarrhoea.

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