Wherever the Need

We take for granted the fact that we can use a toilet whenever we want, but for some 2.6 billion people that option is not available and the impact this has on their lives can be devastating.

Without access to sanitation facilities, millions of people every day have to defecate in the open – that means finding somewhere in a field, forest, river or even the street where they can go to the toilet.

As well as the problems of privacy and safety this causes, open defecation pollutes the local environment, contaminating water sources and spreading disease.

Furthermore, the majority of people without access to sanitation are amongst the world’s poorest. They are often sick, unable to work regularly, provide for their families or access education, becoming trapped in a vicious cycle of ill health and poverty.

This global problem is the least discussed and least publicised – who, after all, wants to talk about toilets?

And yet sanitation saves lives – it creates healthy communities, promotes self-respect and dignity and underpins education and livelihoods.

That is why Wherever the Need puts sanitation first.

Wherever the Need works with communities in some of the poorest parts of the world developing and building sanitation and clean water facilities.

Founded in 1997 we have projects in Sierra Leone, Kenya and India and by the end of 2012 we will have 50,000 people using sanitation facilities we have built.