Tuesday saw the 6th anniversary of “World Toilet Day” and the theme this year is “'Leaving No One Behind.”
“Sanitation is your human right and yet, today, 4.2 billion people live without safely managed sanitation. We must expand access to safe toilets,” the UN wrote in a blog post, explaining the theme.
According to UN statistics, over 637 million people still defecate in the open.
Nearly 297,000 minors succumb to fatal diseases and lose their lives because of improper sanitation and hand hygiene facilities.
In fact, 1.25 billion women and girls still do not have access to hygienic and private toilets.
“Toilets save lives, because human waste spreads killer diseases. ‘World Toilet Day’ is about inspiring action to tackle the global sanitation crisis,” the UN’s post said.
The UN aims to provide sanitation for all by 2030.
Netizens also marked the day on social networking platforms with a trending hashtag #WorldToiletDay which has already received over 173,000 mentions.
Indian politicians including Railway Minister Piyush Goyal and the Chief Minister of West Bengal state Mamata Banerjee also addressed the day and urged people to pledge their contribution towards making India free of open-sanitation.
Earlier in October, the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi said that under the “Swachh Bharat” (Clean India) mission, the open-defecation issue had almost been solved.