Abstract

Introduction: The literature suggests that children living in the areas with widespread opendefecation, lack of access to safe drinking water and provision of hand hygiene are exposed to a higher level of microbial contamination. These conditions often keep children undernourished, diminishes their cognitive skills leading to intergenerational poverty. Methods: Using the individual and household data from Indian Human Development Survey 2012 (IHDS II), the study used binary logistic model to analyse the impact of household-based water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) and health outcome of the children in the Empowered Action Group (EAG) states of India. Results: The study suggested that having access to safe water, the chances of being not stunted are 20 per cent lower compared to the children accessing unsafe water. Similarly, children who have a household toilet and practice better hand hygiene, have 20 per cent higher chances of being not stunted against open defecating children and children who do not practice hand-hygiene habits. Other than WASH, the children’s demographic traits of being at a higher age, being female over male, indicated a significantly higher odds of being stunted. Conclusion: The empirical findings suggests that WASH has the ability to guide the child related policies with concrete approaches. Since the three components of the WASH are interdisciplinary it is suggested that combined WASH intervention have massive personal

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