A global taskforce on WASH in health care facilities: synthesis 2022-2023 (WHO, 30 March 2023)

Summary

The Global Taskforce on WASH in healthcare facilities aims to provide global strategic direction and coordination to the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF and to allow for information exchange and dialogue. The latest World Health Organization (WHO) data show that there are major global gaps in water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services in health care facilities:

• half of health care facilities do not have basic hand hygiene services
• one in five facilities have no water services
• one in ten have no sanitation services.

WHO and UNICEF convened a series of stakeholder ‘think-tanks’ to discuss barriers to progress, coinciding with the launch of the Global Report on WASH in health care facilities. The Global Taskforce on WASH evolved from these think-tanks, and this webpage includes a link to a synthesis of their work in 2022-23.

The purpose of the task force is to:

• encourage and hold accountable national governments to achieve the objectives established by WHA 72/7 and SDG 3 and SDG 6
• reinforce calls for strong health leadership (e.g. mobilising political leaders at global events including G7, G20, UNGA)
• work at country level to increase demand, financing and integration of WASH in health programming and reporting
• support greater collaboration with other initiatives (e.g. UHC, Child/maternal health, AMR, climate smart health systems, Hand Hygiene for All).

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