National survey of menstrual health and hygiene management of adolescent girls

 In partnership with the national apical body responsible for promoting health research across the country Nepal Health Research Council (NHRC), World Vision released a report today that provides comprehensive analysis of the knowledge, attitude and practice and psychosocial well-being of adolescent girls in menstrual hygiene management.

The study titled ‘Status of Menstrual Health and Hygiene Management among Adolescents Girls in Nepal’ concludes that along with having inadequate knowledge around menstruation, adolescent girls continue to face restrictions during periods ranging from restrictions in religious activities, issues of touchability to food consumption. Surveyed in 3,675 adolescent girls (aged 10-19 years) across the country including differently-abled girls, who had experienced their menarche, the study highlighted mothers as the primary source of information who guides menstrual management as well as major bearers to continue restrictions during menstruation at home.

The NHRC and World Vision’s report also concluded that Chaupadi continues to be practiced in three of seven provinces with Sudurpaschim practicing most. “Staying and sleeping alone in a livestock shed at night is fearful and frightening,” an adolescent girl of Achham in Sudurpaschim Province said, adding that family members can't even find if anything happens to us when they menstruate and it is a major problem.

Results of the report also reveal that menstrual needs of differently abled adolescent girls are largely neglected. Their needs are related to availability of menstrual material and disable friendly WASH beyond home. 

“As menstrual taboos, inadequate knowledge and poor menstrual health and hygiene management can have direct negative impacts on psychosocial, mental health, which in turn leads to further negative health outcomes among girls and women, World Vision calls on the government for making deliberate efforts with provincial and local government for formulation of plans, policies and strategies to overcome the gaps in menstrual health and hygiene management directed towards the target group,” Health and Nutrition Portfolio advisor of World Vision International Nepal Abhilasha Gurung said.

The report also offers recommendations for the government to promote sustainable, low cost, affordable and eco-friendly sanitary materials and its distribution to adolescent girls throughout the country and intensify monitoring and supervision of MHM related government programmes, for example - free pad distribution initiative. It also urges the government to allocate budget to establish girl-friendly (ChhatraMaitri) schools and take empowerment and engendered approach to capacitate adolescent girls, making them self-concerned and confident to speak up for their own menstrual health needs with everyone at school including male students and teachers.

ADB affirms commitment to water and sanitation in finance ministers’ meeting

 The Asian Development Bank (ADB) today affirmed its commitment to water and sanitation investments in the 2020 Sanitation and Water for All (SWA) Asia and the Pacific finance ministers’ meeting.

“We know that every dollar invested in water and sanitation results in a four-fold return,” said ADB vice-president for Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development Bambang Susantono. “Together with reduced healthcare costs and greater productivity in the workplace, water and sanitation investments bring long-term returns to individual households and the wider economy. It also helps reduce inequality and empower women.”

Representatives of development agencies and finance ministers from Asia and the Pacific joined the virtual meeting and discussed concrete ways to ensure universal access to water, sanitation, and hygiene. Finance ministers highlighted success stories in the region where governments were able to implement a mix of financing and regulation to ensure people’s access to water and sanitation, which also generates substantial benefits for the economy, public health, and the environment.

Susantono discussed ADB’s $20 billion coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic response package announced on April 13. A multisectoral Water and Health Advisory Team was also established across ADB to expand water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and health interventions to address Covid-19 through these investments. ADB will invest through 2021 more than $3.4 billion in water supply, sanitation, and wastewater treatment.

ADB is also responding with numerous new integrated WASH and health-related technical assistance, loans, and strategic alliances. Aside from being a pandemic response, ADB’s WASH support will also focus on water-related diseases, health, and livelihoods in the long term. The programme will be using an inclusive approach targeting vulnerable groups.

“We remain committed to providing universal access to WASH to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic and build resilience against future pandemics,” he said, adding that these are investments for the future of our people.

The SWA Asia and the Pacific finance ministers’ meeting is one of three regional convenings organised by the SWA partnership. The co-conveners are UNICEF, the World Bank Water Global Practice, and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

ADB is committed to achieving a prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable Asia and the Pacific, while sustaining its efforts to eradicate extreme poverty. Established in 1966, it is owned by 68 members, 49 from the region.

People in Need and partners supporting landslide survivors in Nepal

 In the mountainous regions of Nepal, this year’s monsoon season has triggered 44 recorded landslides in areas that are still trying to rebuild from the devastating earthquake of 2015. So far in 2020, some 64 people have been killed and more than 1,700 families have been displaced in the Sindhupalchowk, Dhading, and Gorkha districts – all while coping with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a press note issued by People in Need (PIN).

Unfortunately, Nepal has not succeeded in effectively mitigating landslide risks, with haphazard road-construction and climate change making the situation worse, it reads, adding that in addition to death toll, the landslides have also caused severe damage to property, devastated livestock, and wiped out arable farmlands.

Krishna Bahadur Newar, who found his home in Barhabise, Sindhupalchowk swept away by a recent landslide, said that it was really difficult for him to think about the incident. “The loss that I suffered is unfathomable,” he said, adding that the sudden landslide not only took away his home and property but also his wife, leaving him and his injured son all alone. “I was frightened and furious at the same time for losing everything.”

In response to the landslides and with humanitarian funding from the European Union (EU), People in Need (PIN) along with its local implementing partner, Phase Nepal, launched the ‘Landslide Emergency Response Project.’ The project team was amongst the first to respond to the recent landslides, deploying immediately after they occurred to carry out an identification and mapping exercise in close collaboration with local officials. The aim was to assist the most affected people with their immediate needs. 

After the landslides destroyed crops and arable land, damaged livelihoods, and swept away homes and possessions, the survivors were left in urgent need of dignified support, including emergency housing and basic aid. People in Need, together with our partners, immediately distributed emergency shelter, non-food items, and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), dignity kits to vulnerable households affected by landslides across three districts, focusing on people with disabilities, pregnant and lactating women, the elderly, and female-headed households, the press note reads.

“During the pandemic, we dispatched our team to the affected districts with an eye toward the Covid-19 situation,” it reads, adding that the needs of the people it met ranged from shelter and enough clean and warm clothing, to essential provisions for new-born babies. “Consultations with locals indicated that they feared further torrential rains amidst the Covid-19 crisis.”

One hundred households were identified as internally displaced, and were prioritised for emergency assistance with temporary shelter kits, consisting of basic materials such as corrugated galvanised iron (CGI) sheets, plain sheeting, and tarpaulins, it adds.

Head of Programmes for PIN Nepal Dan McNamara, explains the urgency of the situation, “Five years on from the devastating earthquake, landslides continue to hit the most vulnerable.”

Unable to return home, families without safe shelter and secure livelihoods are left behind to pick up the pieces, he said, adding that emergency shelter and WASH provisions allow families to get back on their feet at a time of immense uncertainty, exacerbated by the current Covid-19 pandemic. “PIN and the EU Humanitarian Aid's support is just the start, with much more needed if landslide survivors are to secure a dignified and meaningful recovery.”

Finland, UNICEF partner to realise children’s rights to education and water and sanitation services in Nepal

The Government of Finland and UNICEF have expanded their partnership for children in Nepal through programmes in Education and in Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH). At a ceremony held in Kathmandu, ambassador of Finland in Nepal Pertti Anttinen and UNICEF representative in Nepal Elke Wisch signed a partnership agreement for the next three years, committing 8 million Euros to enhance quality services for children in Nepal.
While Nepal has registered significant progress in access to education and water and sanitation services in recent decades, and today the majority of children are enrolled in school, due to challenges with the quality and inclusiveness of education, many are not learning even basic skills. With 71 per cent of households collecting drinking water from contaminated sources, the quality of WASH services is similarly challenged.
In response, the partnership will support a range of early childhood, basic formal education and adolescent non-formal education interventions with a strong focus on improving quality, safety and inclusiveness, particularly for children from different mother tongue backgrounds and for children with disabilities. “WASH interventions will aim provide universal access and water safety for some of the most unreached populations in Nepal,” a press note issued by the UNICEF reads.
“The core goal of Finland’s development policy is to eradicate extreme poverty and to reduce poverty and inequality,” Anttinen said, adding that Finland’s actions strive to promote that the rights of children and the most vulnerable, notably the disabled, are taken account of in all our activities, women and girls are better educated and have better skills, and to ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. “Finland wants to support both the enabling environment and community-level work.”
It is crucial to reach the unreached and leave no one behind when it comes to education and water sanitation," he added. “UNICEF is one of Finland’s long-term partners in Nepal, especially in the WASH and education sectors.”
By entering this partnership, we want to ensure that our work is promoting synergy, harmonisation and complementarity between the sectors and different interventions,” according to him.
“Nepal has made remarkable progress in access to education and water and sanitation coverage over the past few decades since the country committed to improving the situation of child rights as an early signatory to the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC),” Wisch, on the occasion, said.
“As we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the CRC, improving the quality and inclusiveness of services remains the key challenge in our joint efforts to ensure that no child is left behind and ensure that every child in Nepal achieves her individual potential,” she said, adding that the expanded partnership with the Finland will go a long way in bringing safe water and sanitation to the most marginalised communities and in creating an enabling environment to equip today’s children with the knowledge and skills they will need to contribute to the development of their country as Nepal advances towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) targets and the 2030 agenda.

National conference on rainwater harvesting next week

A Kathmandu-based non-profit organisation ‘Smart WASH Solutions’ and Department of Water Supply and Sewerage Management(DWSSM) under the Ministry of Water Supply are set to jointly organise a National Conference on Rainwater Harvesting for Livelihood, Community and Ecosystem Resilience on July 27 and 28 in collaboration with different organisations.
Organising a press conference in the capital today, the conference organising committee informed that preparations for the conference have reached the final stage.
The conference is aimed at making concerned stakeholders aware of how to reduce the impact of floods and rain-triggered-landslides by collecting and utilising rainwater to meet domestic water needs through effective management, they said, adding that the conference will be attended by experts working in the related field from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, South Korea and Nepal.
Minister of Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Barsha Man Pun is scheduled to inaugurate the conference, said the conference organising committee – that is composed of different representatives – led by chair of Smart WASH Solutions Ramdeep Sah. Likewise, a six-member technical committee entrusted with the responsibility of assessing and selecting conference papers has been formed under the leadership of Gunanidhi Paudel. A management committee has also been formed under the leadership of the chair of the Smart WASH Solutions Sah.
Speaking at the press conference, chair of Smart WASH Solutions said that it was impossible to address the problem of drinking water supply until rainwater was properly managed permanently. “About 1.3 per cent of total global population and 2.4 per cent of rural population in developing countries meet the domestic needs for drinking water by collecting and utilizing rainwater,” Shah claimed calling for revival of Nepali tradition of collecting and utilizing rainwater that people belonging to the present generation are unaware of.

WHO stresses access for all to clean water to eliminate tropical diseases

Access for all to clean and safe water is fundamental to controlling and eliminating neglected tropical diseases (NTD) from across the South-East Asia Region, according to a
press release issued by the New Delhi-based World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Office for South-East Asia, coinciding with the World Water Day.
WHO regional director for South-East Asia Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh said in the release that alongside other interventions, access to clean and safe water was a powerful means to ensure all communities could combat and control NTDs and that in partnership with health authorities they could sustain their achievements and accelerate progress.
According to the Region’s Flagship Priorities, recent progress against NTDs has been substantial. In 2015 India was declared yaws-free. In 2016 Maldives and Sri Lanka eliminated lymphatic filariasis as a public health problem. Bangladesh, India and Nepal have meanwhile made substantial gains against visceral leishmaniasis, while in 2018 Nepal was validated to have eliminated trachoma as a public health problem, with the WHO SAFE strategy and its emphasis on access to clean water crucial to its success.
"Further progress is needed," she said, adding that the most recent figures show that the region is the world’s second most affected by NTDs, with remote and hard-to-reach communities bearing the bulk of the burden. "It is no coincidence that these are the very same communities that are most disadvantaged when it comes to accessing clean and safe water, sanitation and hygiene."
As WHO’s recently released toolkit – ‘WASH and health working together: A ‘how-to’ guide for Neglected Tropical Disease programmes’ – outlines, WASH must be core to any NTD programme. National NTD programmes region-wide should work with partners and across sectors to target affected populations and make full use of the tool, the release reads.
Where communities lack access to clean and safe water, for example, sustainable solutions must be found. That could mean addressing stigma-based exclusion from improved drinking water sources or ensuring health care facilities and schools – particularly in rural areas – have improved water and hygiene services available, Dr Khetrapal Singh suggested.  It could also mean ensuring access to handwashing facilities where appropriate, and that household waste is safely disposed of to prevent the transmission of diseases such as schistosomiasis and soil transmitted helminthiases.
"Ongoing information on the effectiveness of policies is crucial to adapting interventions and ensuring the inattention that defines NTDs and exposes whole communities to stigma and marginalisation is overcome," she said.

UK aid support to victims of devastating floods in South Asia

The International Development secretary today announced that the Department for International Development (DfID) is allocating further support to the flood response in Nepal, including by providing clean water, sanitation and hygiene services, as well as support immediate food security needs and health support.
Monsoon flooding and landslides have affected an estimated 8 million and 1.7 million people in Bangladesh and Nepal, respectively.
DfID is allocating £400,000 to the Nepal Red Cross Society in partnership with the British Red Cross and International Federation of the Red Cross for monsoon flood response. Some 75 per cent of the support is earmarked for water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), livelihood recovery, and health.
The support will provide safe water supply to over 13,000 people, ensure over 3,000 of those most severely affected receive immediate food and financial support and reach over 2,000 women and girl’s with health supplies.
According to the International Development secretary Priti Patel the devastating flooding in South Asia is truly heart-breaking. "Entire communities have lost their homes, their livelihoods and their loved ones," she asaid, adding that the UK has stepped up to support the region, the pre-positioned relief supplies ensured thousands of people received immediate support and we continue to provide assistance to vulnerable people, who have lost everything. "Today’s announcement will provide clean water and prevent the spread of deadly and crippling diseases, as we continue to work to meet the immediate needs of people on the ground."
The announcement is the latest support the UK has provided to Bangladesh and Nepal. It includes the Humanitarian Staging Area at the capital’s airport in Kathmandu that was built with funding from UK aid and provides one of the main relief coordination centres for the government. UK preparedness support, through Oxfam, is providing immediate relief supplies to 30,000 people for emergency shelter and WASH. DFID is also supporting overall coordination.
The UK will continue to monitor the situation in both countries, and work with their governments to support immediate needs and to help people and communities affected to recover once flooding has receded, it added. "Flooding has also affected India, where the UK continues to monitor the situation, and our thoughts are with those that have been affected."