The country has the largest number of people defecating in the open With as many as 597 million people practising open defecation, India still has the largest number of people defecating in open in the world, according to a new UN report. The report — Progress on Drinking Water and Sanitation (2014 update) — released on Friday says 82 per cent of the one billion people practising open defection in the world live in just 10 countries. Worse, despite having some of the highest numbers of open defecators, India does not feature among the countries making great strides in reducing open defecation, the report jointly prepared by the WHO and the UNICEF says. In contrast, India’s immediate neighbour Bangladesh and Vietnam, are among the top 10 countries that have achieved the highest reduction in open defecation since 1990. Vietnam, Bangladesh and Peru have reduced open defecation prevalence to single digits, according to the report. According to the UN, countries where open defecation is most widely practised have the highest number of deaths of children under the age of five, as well as high levels of under-nutrition, high levels of poverty and large disparities between the rich and poor. There are also strong gender impacts: lack of safe, private toilets makes women and girls vulnerable to violence and is an impediment to girls’ education, it says.

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