Impact of sanitation and clean drinking water on the prevalence of diarrhea among the under-five children in India

Abstract

• Improved sanitation facility in the household helps to reduce diarrhea prevalence among the under-five children. • As compare to earlier studies in India no such improvement has been seen in diarrhea condition among under-five children in India. • Compare to earlier studies more coverage of improved sanitation and clean drinking water facilities have been seen in India. Prevalence of diarrhea among the under-five children is the predominant problem in developing countries, even in India also. The availability of improved drinking water and sanitation facility can help to reduce the prevalence of diarrhea. This study aims to make an association between diarrhea prevalence among under-five children with the availability of improved drinking water and sanitation facility. The study was carried out with Nation Family Health Survey (NFHS-4:2015–16) data published by the International Institute for Population Science (IIPS), Mumbai. Initially, some descriptive study has made between dependant and independent variables. Later on, binary logistic regressions were run with adjusted and crude effects between drinking water andsanitation facility with diarrhea prevalence. Our study has indicated that improved sanitation facility has an impact on the reduction of under-five children diarrhea prevalence in India. But due to maximum improved water coverage, it has shown no such impact on diarrhea prevalence. Among the other socio-economic variables age of the child, sex, birth order, caste, religion, resident, mother's age, wealth index also has a deep-rooted impact on diarrhea prevalence. So policymakers need to focus proper coverage and utilization of the sanitation facility and expand awareness among the masses.