Clean water, safe sanitation and good hygiene are fundamental to infection prevention and control and the delivery of safe, dignified, quality healthcare for all. But there are alarming gaps in the provision of these essential services in healthcare facilities across the world.

Why is WASH in healthcare facilities important?

A hygienic environment with clean water, adequate sanitation and good hygiene practices by healthcare staff, patients and their caregivers is essential for quality care and for patient and staff safety. A healthcare facility without water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) poses significant risks to staff and patients, and can contribute to millions of healthcare-acquired infections each year. These infections can result in prolonged hospital stays, long-term disabilities, increased antimicrobial resistance, higher healthcare costs for families and health systems, and even death. Inadequate WASH and high infection rates can also damage patients’ trust in health systems, affecting their willingness to seek care when they need it. They can also reduce health workers' safety, morale, attendance and retention.

A foundation of strong resilient health systems

Our report gathers expertise and experience from more than 12 countries and highlights the urgent need to address the WASH crisis in healthcare facilities, to improve the quality of health services and behaviours, and create resilient health systems.

Image: WaterAid/ Ko Ko Htay

We contribute to improving inclusive and sustainable WASH in healthcare facilities through policy, advocacy, modelling WASH services and behaviours, training and research. We underpin all of this with a systems strengthening approach so that health workers, their patients and the larger community have access to sustainable services.

To support the universal health coverage goals of ensuring that safe services reach everyone, strong health systems need:

  • strong government leadership
  • skilled personnel
  • informed and empowered citizens 
  • gender and social inclusion
  • good sector governance and accountability
  • clear and focused policies
  • sustainable financing
  • access to health information systems
     

Therefore, improving WASH and broader environmental health conditions demands a system-wide, holistic approach.

Ensuring that quality service delivery and behaviour change will last requires working through all the elements of the health system. To strengthen health systems to improve and embed WASH, we model the quality delivery of services and behaviour-change strategies so they can be scaled up, support the development and implementation of policies, empower and build the capacity of workers, and advocate for improvements.

Over the past five years, WASH in healthcare facilities has gathered momentum in the global health and development agenda. The adoption of a World Health Assembly resolution on WASH in healthcare facilities in May 2019 was a huge milestone, and an effort WaterAid drove and influenced substantially in support of member states. The resolution is a specific, public commitment by all of the world’s health ministers to invest in action on WASH in healthcare facilities.

Thematic areas of our work


Latest resources and expert opinion

Top image: Rabeya Khatun, the community healthcare provider at at Paithali Community Clinic, washes her hands at the handwashing corner. Khulna, Bangladesh. June 2022.

Second image: A nurse takes care of Ma Naing Naing, 33, and her baby in one of the baby rooms of Hinthada hospital, Myanmar. March 2020.    

Last updated: May 2024