-The Hindustan Times Every second woman in rural India walked an average 173 kilometres - the distance between Delhi and Vrindavan - to fetch potable water in 2012, making her trek 25 kilometres longer than what it was in 2008-09. Data released this week by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), a ministry of statistics and programme implementation wing, gives two broad hints when compared with previous studies: economic...

-Down to Earth NSSO report shows half of India has no access to sanitation, drainage or waste disposal A national sample survey report, released on Thursday, reveals that a third of married couples in India do not have separate room to themselves, affecting their privacy and health. The 69th round of survey report of the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) states that only 68 per cent rural households and 73 per cent of...

-The Hindu Business Line Battling childhood diarrhoea with an Indian vaccine is good strategy Almost half of India's 1,76,000 diarrhoeal deaths in children below five are caused by rotavirus, the pathogen responsible for severe childhood diarrhoea. In addition, 8 lakh hospitalisations and over 30 lakh outpatient visits each year among children below 5 are triggered by diarrhoea of rotavirus origin. WHO recommends the rotavirus vaccine for infants in all national immunisation programmes. Globally,...

-The Hindu   An improvement in sanitation and cleanliness will eliminate much of the difference in malnutrition between India and the rest of the world, and across Indian States Historically the greatest advances in longevity and mortality reduction have come not from treatment of individual disease but from public health. This includes modern drainage and sewerage systems (sewage treatment plants), drinking water systems that produce and deliver disease-free water and solid waste disposal...

-Daily Pioneer Aware that convincing people, particularly in rural India, to build and use toilets in their homes, is a cumbersome task, the Centre has asked the State Governments to rope in various departments like education and health to raise awareness about the importance of sanitation in rural areas. The move aims to make the country open defecation free (ODF) by 2019. The Modi Government in its maiden budget 2014-15 had...