Clean Hands Saves Lives - Lifelong Impact

Many children in remote rural villages do not have access to toilets. They defecate in the bush which leads to the spread of disease and illness. They have no facilities to wash their hands which leads to the rapid spread of germs. This leads to people getting ill. 

Over 2,000 children under the age of 5 die each day in the world because they do not have access to good sanitation and hygiene facilities. Village by Village is trying to reduce the suffering and needless deaths of children living in poverty in remote rural villages. 

Over 2.5 billion people in the world do not have access to a suitable toilet and most of those are in sub saharan Africa. Diarrhea is the second biggest killer of children under 5 in the developing world .Over 1.3 million children die each year because they do not have access to a toilet and the facilities to wash their hands properly. Simply having a toilet, water and soap will reduce the suffering and deaths of children.

To improve the life chances of some of the most vulnerable individuals and communities within Ghana our ‘Clean Hands Saves Lives’ project provides sanitation facilities whilst also addressing behavioural change to support a life­time impact. 

Each project begins with the help of our local & international volunteers who work alongside our team of Ghanaian builders to build a three toilet block within a school. These toilet blocks support sanitation as their self composting design ensures flies entering the toilet are trapped inside the pit latrine.

We capture all the rain water in filtering poly tanks which also make the water safe to drink, thereby giving the children access to safe drinking water at school alongside sanitation facilities. We build handwashing stations so multiple children can wash their hands together

Once the necessary facilities have been provided, an intensive supporting phase will commence over an 18 month period. This establishes new patterns of behaviour to embed hand­washing to improve sanitation. We provide the teachers and children with promotional materials to incentivise, reward and encourage behavioural change, including stickers, pencils, pens, radios and other materials.l. 

We know that our programme works. We have received independent Monitoring and Evaluation statistics that demonstrate handwashing in these villages has risen to over 90%. This has reduced suffering and child mortality. The programme seeks to enable the schools to carry on long after we have left. We are extremely grateful for your ongoing support