Only 59% of Samar households have sanitary toilets; 81% have access to water

By PIA Samar
June 8, 2010

CATBALOGAN CITY  –  Samar’s newly elected leaders are challenged with this health and sanitation data.

In the record of the Samar Integrated Provincial Health Office, it revealed that only some 59% of Samar province households have sanitary toilets.

The data was culled from the IPHO records in calendar year 2009.

There is an improvement though, on scrutiny, comparing the two consecutive years, in 2008, only 51% of the 100,193 households in Samar have sanitary toilets then, commonly called as comfort rooms or ‘CR’. A difference of 7,451 was noted.

This area remains problematic, according to IPHO reports.

As regards access to water, IPHO reported that some 81% of the total households in Samar have access to safe water.

Some municipalities like Paranas, Sta. Rita, Pinabacdao, Villareal and and Sto. Niño use sodium hypochlorite (hyposal) to purify water.

The mentioned municipalities are beneficiaries of a water and sanitation project of WHO, PCWS, DOH and the Italian Government which benefited at least some 112,212 households from the project.

Hyposol is a water disinfectant used in raw and contaminated water. It is aimed to provide households with useful and practical approach to water quality to prevent onslaught of diseases that may afflict them when ingesting unsafe water.