About Water and Sanitation Health
What we do
Water and Sanitation Health works with villages to build sustainable water/sanitation systems and support health initiatives in communities. This involves finding out community needs, raising awareness about the need for improvements, and devising low-cost solutions to potable water systems and latrines. It also includes training community members in the maintenance of water and sanitation system. Provision of new systems takes place hand-in-hand with health promotion to ensure the facilities are used to improve health. Children are particularly involved in promoting health messages and improved hygiene behavior.
How we do this
Community Pueblo Viejo, Marcala, La Paz, Honduras
Helping communities to construct water systems, install pumps and care for their water supplies
Training local people as plumbers, pump mechanics and providing them with tools and spare parts
Establishing and supporting local community water management committees to look after and repair village water systems
Building concrete water storage tanks, providing washing slabs for laundry, animal drinking troughs and water run-off for local irrigation
Combating poor sanitation by building latrines and improving health education
Developing schemes to minimise rain or flood water damage in vulnerable areas
Constructing small dams to provide villages with drinking water and irrigation schemes
Establishing adequate safe water supplies and sanitation following natural disasters and in refugee camps
Community Santa Rosita, Marcala, La Paz, Honduras
What we've done
Water and Sanitation Health (WASH) has completed several projects including: a coffee processing facility for an indigenous community, an HIV/AIDS awareness campaign, a women’s birthing center as well as a sustainable vegetable garden in the Honduras, department of La Paz, municipality of Marcala. WASH helped develop, install and monitor new inexpensive sustainable technology to clean and disinfect drinking water in rural areas. This resulted in 25 communities receiving clean disinfected water. WASH also completed two rain water collection systems that resulted in two schools, Santa Rosita and Los Charcos, receive clean drinking water.
Who we are
Water and Sanitation Health was started by Executive Director Eric Harrison with the help of engineers at the Department of Defense in 2006. Funding for Water and Sanitation Health has come from Rotary International and the International Rural Water Association. WASH is a 501(c)(3) tax exempt organization. WASH has designed, constructed, rehabilitated and expanded rural water and sanitation systems in Central America.
What we're doing now...
With the help of Dole Foods, Inc., Water and Sanitation Health’s next big project is a Clean Water Project in the municipality of Ocós, Guatemala. The project will help community members and children have access to clean water. The provision of this simple commodity, a necessity for life, will prevent disease and significantly raise the quality of life for the residents of the villages.