Spotlight Newsletter | World Toilet Day

Every year, World Toilet Day celebrates what toilets do for us – from taking away our waste to protecting our health, safety, and dignity. This year's theme is Valuing Toilets, a reminder that 3.6 billion people do not have access to a ‘safely managed toilet’ and other basic sanitation systems.

Life without a toilet is dirty, dangerous, and undignified. Public health depends on adequate access to water and sanitation including toilet facilities; the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted how something as seemingly basic as hand washing is crucial in helping prevent the spread of disease. COVID-19 has also exposed deep inequalities in water and sanitation access around the world, with the most vulnerable and marginalised communities suffering the greatest impact. Toilets also drive improvements and change in gender equality, education, economics, and the environment.

World Toilet Day calls upon governments and decision makers around the world to ensure that water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH), and infrastructure have an upfront, fundamental role in their investment, planning, policy, and governance, leaving no one behind. Water, sanitation, and hygiene are central to many aspects of the Hub’s research – read more about our ongoing work and some of our reflections for this World Toilet Day.