4 lakh lives can be saved if all rural households get clean water

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Almost 4 lakh diarrhoeal disease deaths can be averted if ‘Jal Jeevan Mission' meets its target of providing clean water to all rural households, according to a new study by the World Health Organisation. The Centre launched the Jal Jeevan Mission in 2019 to provide all houses in rural areas with safe and adequate drinking water through individual tap connections by next year.

The Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation had asked the World Health Organisation (WHO) to conduct a study to assess potential health gains and associated cost savings due to increased access in safely-managed drinking water services in India. The study found that, on an estimate, if the Mission provided safely-managed drinking water to all of India, this would result in averting almost 4 lakh deaths caused by diarrhoeal disease.

According to official figures, till now 62 per cent rural households have been provided with tap water connection. Dr Rajiv Bahl, director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research, said these findings are plausible. "These are gross underestimates of the total benefits of providing safe water not only because these benefits go beyond health and they affect many communicable and non-communicable diseases. And even malnutrition, which is a big issue for us as they are all also related to water, so we must consider these just modest assumptions and tip of the iceberg."

‘36% Indians have hypertension'

The prevalence of diabetes in India in 2021 was 11.4 per cent, while 35.5 per cent and 15.3 per cent of people suffered from hypertension and pre-diabetes, respec-tively, as per the findings of a nationwide survey published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology journal. In 2017, the team found that the prevalence of diabetes in India was around 7.5 per cent.

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