By Ogbonnaya Akoma
Without a doubt, one of the problems public health face any where in Nigeria today bothers on the fact that more Nigerians have continued to defecate in the open instead of using approved latrines and toilets. This practice gives rise to many diseases that go ahead to affect the health of the people.
Obviously, open and promiscuous defecation is a public health nuisance that is often associated with offensive odour, fly infestation, unsightliness, and contraction of different cysts of different worms, contamination and fouling of water sources, among others. This is why the Public Health Law and other laws on the subject, makes it an offence the environmental health officers are empowered and mandated to punish when detected through inspecting all premises with a view to finding out the availability or otherwise of sanitary conveniences in such places. Those who fail to provide such conveniences are usually prosecuted in law courts since the act goes ahead to encourage people to engage in open defecation.
From what is happening in Nigeria today, it seems more people engage in open defecation throughout the country, whether it is in the villages or the townships. According to reports, more than sixty million Nigerians still engage in open defecation with the attendant health hazards associated with the nuisance. There are down-to-earth, obvious reasons why this ugly situation persists in our midst. The number one is that health education services are no longer carried to household members as was the practice in the past.
In those days, trained public health educators visited various households to disseminate health education information and tit bits with a view to enlightening householders on what they should or not do towards protecting their health and that of their neighbours. During such visits, the public health educators educated and told householders the need to build any of the approved latrines or toilets and use same towards the promotion and protection of their individual health and that of their neighbours; such householders were also reminded that they could be prosecuted in the law courts should they fail to provide latrines or toilets and use same.
Second, in those days, the sanitary inspectors, now called environmental health officers, visited all premises with a view to detecting public health nuisances in them including the provision or otherwise of sanitary conveniences for use by the occupiers of such premises. Subsequently, landlords and landladies of all premises found out to be without conveniences were notified, through the service on such landlords, abatement notices which gave them some time to provide such conveniences. If such landlords failed to comply with the terms of the notices served on them, they were prosecuted in the appropriate courts of law towards securing the execution of the terms of such abatement notices in the interest of public health.
Today, this life-saving duty is not carried out again in our midst because of many obstacles. First, the environmental health officers who are statutorily required to visit every household to detect those without toilets are just not there. As they retire, they are not replaced, so their number continues to dwindle to the extent that there are less than four thousand of them today in whole of Nigeria who are expected to serve more than two hundred million Nigerians, according to reports.
On the other hand, the few of them that are available are not equipped to render effective environmental health services to the people through providing them with regular means of movement, payment of out-of-pocket expenses, provision of materials with which they could render effective services, just as many states and local governments have continued to politicise environmental health duties in their areas through the use of legion quacks and political cronies, among other ways.
Since the environmental health officers are the personnel statutorily required to check open defecation in our midst through house-to-house, sanitary inspection of premises, detecting and punishing those who do not own and use latrines and toilets in such households and who go ahead to defecate in the open, efforts should be made to engage their services now, more than ever before, towards stopping open defecation in Nigeria. There is no need to make a new law to check open defecation as the regional Public Health Laws, the National Environmental Health Practice Regulations and other laws are already in place but needs to be enforced through engaging the services of the environmental health officers.
All we need are increasing their number, providing what they need to be effective and deploying them effectively towards checking open defecation in Nigeria, and the political will to do this as what obtained in the old Imo State between 1980 and 1983.
On their own part, the environmental health officers in our midst must elect to turn a new leaf and decide to render effective environmental health services to Nigerians. This is because they are often accused of demanding and receiving bribes and gratifications in the daily discharge of their life-saving duties. This is one of the reasons why many Nigerians today debase, disregard and belittle them, and go ahead to treat their presence with contempt and disdain, and abject rejection.
The moment the environmental health officers are mobilised towards ending open defecation, their numbers increased across the country, equipment and materials provided for them to work with and, of course, with attitudinal changes expected from the officers themselves, open and promiscuous defecation will be fought to a standstill throughout the country and the protection of public health will be guaranteed for all.
The best time to start this is today.
