How Many People Get Sick Each Year Due to Poor Hygiene?

Hygiene, being a privilege, is a notion that does not bode well with many people. Washing your hands, brushing your teeth, cleaning your home, or taking a shower may seem like simple activities, yet not everyone has the means or will to practice them properly. This results in millions spent on medication. People with a poor financial background often don’t get access to clean water, toilets, and basic cleansing products. Living in congested areas with open sewers, a lack of ventilation, and poor garbage disposal further dials down the benefits of basic hygiene activities. Data from global health agencies show that millions of people become sick each year due to poor hygiene. Let's look at the hygiene-related disease statistics to understand this problem in detail.

Here’s what global sanitation illness data says.

People are not only falling sick due to poor hygiene, but also dying in the process. According to data from the World Health Organization, 1.4 billion die every year due to diseases caused by poor sanitation, unsafe drinking water, and a horribly bad living environment. Take any of the most feared diseases, and the number of people dying from poor hygiene is still higher than that. There was research published by The Lancet back in 2019, which highlighted that more than 74 million healthy life years could have been saved with a global and focused push for better hygiene and sanitation. The ongoing global conflicts and dying, fighting for critical UN support bodies, have further deteriorated the condition in recent years. Most of these lives are lost in low and middle-income countries where a large portion of the population can’t afford to live in hygienic places. In fact, more than half a million people die every year simply because they don’t have access to basic handwashing facilities, which is more than the total number of homicides globally every year.

What are the most common poor hygiene-related diseases?

People are falling sick due to poor sanitation; in this day and age, this is a grave concern for the whole of humanity. One look at global illness rates due to waterborne diseases will show you that it's the biggest culprit, with diarrhea-related illness and death topping the chart. The biggest affected group is young children, especially those under the age of five. You’ll be shocked to learn that more than 2 billion people consume water contaminated with fecal material globally, a large number living in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. That’s why there is a need for a combined effort to improve water cleaning infrastructure and access to basic sanitation.

Respiratory infections are also a major problem; in 2021, more than 10 million people died because of this. Some studies show that washing hands properly and having access to clean, high-quality masks can severely bring down transmission rates, especially in schools and childcare centers where germs spread quickly. Sanitation and health statistics point to cholera and typhoid as major contributors to the lack of hygienic diseases. Typhoid cases range between 11 and 20 million, out of which 161 thousand result in death. Cholera cases come in the range of 3 million globally, with over 1 million resulting in death. Wherever clean water and sanitation are missing, these diseases continue to thrive.

How many children get sick due to poor hygiene?

Children bear the highest impact of poor hygiene on health. Global sanitation illness data show that around tens of millions of children fall sick every year due to poor hygiene, and hundreds of thousands die in the process. Around 800 die every year from diarrheal-related conditions. Under the age of five, around 3 lakh diarrheal-related deaths occurred in a single year. As per the WHO, around 4 lakh children's lives could be saved by providing better access to clean water, sanitation, and a hygienic environment. Pneumonia, diarrhea, and malaria were responsible for 30% of global deaths among children under 5 in 2019, and all of them are highly linked to poor hygiene and sanitation. Sepsis, an infection caused by poor hygiene in health facilities, is linked to more than 6 lakh newborn deaths. A simple act of washing hands with soap can save millions of people from falling sick due to poor sanitation.

Conclusion

The impact of poor hygiene on health is quite severe. Improving access to clean toilets, safe water, and proper sanitation in schools, homes, and hospitals can dramatically reduce illness. As per WHO & UNICEF, less than $10 billion is required to improve water, sanitation, and hygiene in the world’s 46 least developed countries, which comes to just $1 per person every year. In return, the lives saved and healthcare costs avoided will be gigantic. It won’t be an exaggeration to say that this is the world’s biggest and most ignored health crisis. Hygiene isn’t a luxury; it’s a basic human right.