正文

联合国报告:印度厕所不如手机普及

2010-04-19来源:和谐英语

Far more people in India have access to a mobile phone than to a toilet, according to a UN study on how to improve sanitation levels globally.

India's mobile subscribers totalled 563.73 million at the last count, enough to serve nearly half of the country's 1.2 billion population.

But just 366 million people -- around a third of the population -- had access to proper sanitation in 2008, said the study published by the United Nations University, a UN think-tank.

"It is a tragic irony to think in India, a country now wealthy enough that roughly half of the people own phones," so many people "cannot afford the basic necessity and dignity of a toilet," said UN University director Zafar Adeel.

Adeel heads the UN University's Institute for Water, Environment and Health, based in the Canadian city of Hamilton, which prepared the report.

Worldwide, an estimated 358 billion dollars is needed between now and 2015 to achieve the UN Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the proportion of people with inadequate sanitation from 2000 levels.

Proper sanitation "could do more to save lives, especially those of young people, improve health and help pull India and other countries in similar circumstances out of poverty than any alternative investment," Adeel said.

Poor sanitation is a major contributor to water-borne diseases, which in the past three years alone killed an estimated 4.5 million children under the age of five worldwide, according to the study.

The report gave a rough cost of 300 dollars to build a toilet, including labour, materials and advice.

The world could expect a return of up to 34 dollars for every dollar spent on sanitation through improved productivity and reduced poverty and health costs, said Adeel.

He said improving sanitation was "an economic and humanitarian opportunity of historic proportions."

联合国一项关于如何改善全球卫生条件的研究显示，印度的手机远比厕所普及。

据最近一次的统计数据显示，印度手机用户数达到5.6373亿，占该国总人口（总人口12亿）数的近一半。

但据这份由联合国智囊机构联合国大学发表的研究显示，2008年该国仅有3.66亿人口（约占总人口的三分之）能享受到合格的卫生条件。

联合国大学的扎法．阿迪尔所长说：“在印度这样一个日益富裕，近一半人口都拥有手机的国家，却有这么多的人用不起厕所这样的基本生活设施及其所代表的起码的尊严，不能不说具有可悲的讽刺意味。”

阿迪尔是联合国大学水资源、环境和健康研究所的所长，该研究所总部位于加拿大的哈密尔顿，是该研究报告的主要撰写机构。

从现在到2015年，全球预计需要投资3580亿美元才能达到联合国将缺乏合格卫生条件的人口数量减少至2000年一半的千年发展目标。

阿迪尔说，改善卫生设施“是挽救生命，尤其是年轻人的生命，以及改善健康状况、帮助印度和其他境况相似的国家摆脱贫困的最为有效的投资”。

根据该研究，恶劣的卫生条件是水传播疾病的一大诱因，通过这一方式传播的疾病在过去三年内共导致了全球约450万五岁以下的儿童丧生。

据研究报告估计，建造一个厕所的成本约为300美元，其中包括劳动力、材料和建筑指导。

阿迪尔说，全世界在改善卫生条件上每花一美元，就能因生产力的提高、贫困和医疗成本的减少而得到34美元的回报。

他说，改善卫生条件是“一个历史性的经济与人道主义的机遇”。