Lack of toilets is a killer

This is not a typical malehealth story but the statistic at the heart of it is so shocking it needs to be brought to as wide an audience as possible.

According to the World Toilet Association, who are pretty much your bog-standard global campaigning organisation, lack of proper toilet facilities kills almost two million people a year, most of them children.

'It is regrettable that the matter of defecation is not given as much attention as food or housing,' Sim Jae-duck, the association's South Korean head, told the WTA's first meeting at its headquarters south of Seoul — the building, right, is 'lavatory- shaped'.

Sim, who is nicknamed 'Mr. Toilet', said some 2.6 billion people worldwide do not have access to proper toilet facilities, with potentially fatal consequences. (The two million figure is based on the fact that about 1.8 million people die every year from diarrheal diseases that are mainly caused by inadequate sanitation.)

The United Nations has declared 2008 the "Year of Sanitation" and is calling for a renewed effort to improve sanitation and hygiene facilities, especially in developing countries.

'The funding needed is not overwhelmingly large, but the return is immense,' said Vanessa Tobin of U.N. children's agency UNICEF. 'Political support is extremely important. Advocacy for this issue is a high priority.'

Most people who don't have access to a proper bog are poor people living in rural areas. According to the UN, spending $10 billion a year could halve the proportion of people without basic toilet facilities by 2015. Tobin estimates that this investment would net an estimated $84 billion in savings from improved public health and better living conditions.

In some cultures, the solution requires very little water, as is the case in sub-Saharan Africa where ash on top of a pit is often all that is needed, she said.

• Photo: Ahn Young Soon, Associated Press