The importance of handwashing: ensuring access within the COVID-19 response

The COVID-19 pandemic has validated what the water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) sector has long been saying; that WASH is the first line of defence against the spread of communicable diseases.

In Nepal, the impact of lack of access to WASH services and facilities is even more acute in public areas and institutions. In the Dailekh district for example, several public schools – closed since the start of the pandemic – had been converted into quarantine centres to accommodate returnees (mostly Nepali migrant workers).

Early on, in an effort to manage the spread of the virus, the government decreed for all returnees to spend 14 days in quarantine centres before they would be considered safe to reunite with their families and communities.

SNV, a trusted and established organisation in Nepal began building on their expertise in area-wide sanitation programming and hygiene behaviour change communications. With support from the Australian Government, through their Water for Women project, SNV worked with local partners to help communities prepare for COVID-19. They introduced a simple foot-operated handwashing with soap (HWSS) design. With SNV’s local partner Everest Club, local manufacturers were contracted to build and install foot-operated HWSS facilities across 26 priority public locations in Dailekh: schools converted into quarantine centres and health care facilities.

To facilitate the proper use and operation of the handwashing stations, members of Quarantine Management Committees were trained to monitor facility use and functionality and maintain the them. Parallel to these efforts, hygiene and awareness messaging from SNV has remained strong, this has been a challenge that must be approached from multiple angles to achieve behaviour change on a large scale.

Through micro-level community messaging coupled with broadcasting messages via local radio stations, loudspeaker or hoarding boards, personal and institutional hygiene measures were reaching quarantine centre staff, schoolteachers, rural municipality officials, elected representatives and communities.

These early efforts paid off, with Nepal managing to maintain control over the virus, and with beahviour change campaigns reaching over 9,800 people.

In makeshift quarantine centres and health care facilities in Thantikandh alone, the six foot-operated HWSS facilities are now being used by 1,300 people. Soon, as Thantikadh schools re-open to students – almost 1,500 students are expected to benefit from sanitation and hygiene improvements ongoing.

The successful roll-out and functionality of the HWSS stations – with support from local manufacturers – has also convinced the Thantikadh government to scale up the designs. Six more strategic locations within the area are being considered for the installation of the handwashing stations.

"We appreciate SNV’s partnership with us," said a Thantikandh Chairperson. "We envisage the installation of six more HWSS. If the (SNV) project support is not possible, we should be able to manage from our own budget."

The handwashing stations are very helpful in managing quarantined places, especially during such challenging situations. It goes to show how SNV is working to protect communities now, and also provide hygiene infrastructure that is useful into the future, through their WASH delivery.