By Our Reporter
SATO, providers of smart and affordable sanitary solutions, has unveiled a sustainable solution to improve community sanitation and hygiene.
Poor sanitation and hygiene poses an imminent threat to the health and general well-being of the community. It is linked to transmission of diseases such as cholera, diarrhea, dysentery and typhoid.
In a bid to address this, SATO has renovated and upgraded the pit latrines at Emmanuel College in Kazo, Kawempe, giving them the functionality of a flush toilet. Pit latrines are breeding grounds for flies, which can carry and transmit diseases.
Speaking during the handover ceremony on Monday, Timothy Kayondo, Country Director SATO noted that proper sanitation and hygiene is critical in keeping the girl child in school.
“Girls often drop out of school because of menstrual issues and hygiene among others. We believe by partnering with schools to enhance their sanitation and hygiene through improving and upgrading the school latrines is one of the ways to encourage girls to stay in school.” Timothy Kayondo said.
According to Timothy Kayondo, putting SATO pans on the latrines helps keep away flies, block the foul smell and also makes it easy to clean them. The pans are placed directly above existing pit latrines and operate much like a trap door, using a counterweight to stay closed except for allowing the passage of waste.
“We plan to encourage other schools that are still using pit latrines to adopt this new solution. Putting a SATO pan is not an expensive venture because you can just retrofit the pan on an existing pit latrine with one SATO pan costing just Ushs 15,000/=.” He added.
Kigumba Paul, the headmaster of Emmanuel College expressed gratitude for the improved and renovated toilets, noting that it will greatly improve sanitation and hygiene around the school.
“We thank SATO for donating improved SATO pans to our pit latrines and also renovating them. We believe this is the way to go for all schools and encourage them to also embrace this initiative.” Paul Kigumba said.