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| - An infographic claiming India is on the top in global defecation is false.
BOOM found that countries like Eritrea, Chad, and Niger, among others, have higher rates of open defecation compared to India.
The infographic, titled "Open Defecation, 2023," cites the "Alberta Institute of Data Collection" as its source. It shows global open defecation rates, falsely placing India at the top as the only country with over 1,000 people per square kilometer defecating in the open.
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Fact-check
BOOM first verified the infographic and found it to be fake. The mentioned source, "Alberta Institute of Data Collection," does not exist, and no such study on open defecation was conducted by it.
We referred to sources such as the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), World Health Organization (WHO), and Our World in Data for recent global data on open defecation, but the latest information available is from 2022. According to WHO/UNICEF, open defecation is defined as “defecation in fields, forests, bushes, bodies of water, or other open spaces.”
The latest WHO data shows that Eritrea, an East African country, has the highest open defecation rate at 67%, not India, which is at around 11%. However, this data is from 2016, according to the WHO dashboard. The next highest rates, as per 2022 are in Niger (65%), Chad (63%), and South Sudan (60%), Benin (48.5%), among others, all located in Sub-Saharan Africa.
According to WHO/UNICEF’s Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP), a global database on water supply, sanitation and hygiene, open defecation rates have been steadily decreasing over the years. Between 2000 and 2022, the number of people practicing open defecation dropped from 1.3 billion to 419 million, a reduction of more than two-thirds. However, in 2022, 36 countries still had open defecation rates between 5% and 25%, and in 13 countries, more than one in four people still practised it.
Additionally, data indicates that over 20 countries in Africa had higher open defecation rates than India, according to Our World in Data.
Data also shows that India ranks 30th in the list, as of 2022.
A closer look at India reveals a significant decline in open defecation rates, falling from 73.3% in 2000 to 11.1% in 2022.
India launched the Swachh Bharat Mission in 2014, and by 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the country open defecation free (ODF). However, India is not completely free of open defecation. The WHO reported that in 2022, 17% of India's rural population still practiced open defecation, and 25% lacked basic sanitation facilities.
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