Public defence in Water and Environmental Engineering, M.Sc. (Tech) Anni Juvakoski

Title of the thesis: Out of the WASH box – Towards a wider contextualization of the water, sanitation, and hygiene sector

Doctoral Student: Anni Juvakoski
Opponent: Research Scholar, PhD Adriana Gómez Sanabria, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria
Custos: Professor Olli Varis, Aalto University, School of Engineering, Department of Built Environment

This is an interdisciplinary dissertation on the effects of water, sanitation, and hygiene on health particularly in low-income areas.

Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) have long been recognized as a central approach in improving health in low-income areas. Deficient WASH causes hundreds of thousands of diarrheal deaths and even more severe morbidity annually. The UN (2023) states that WASH is the most basic human need related to health and wellbeing. 

However, in this interdisciplinary dissertation, evidence was found against WASH always being the first priority for improving health even in areas with inadequate WASH services. The significance of WASH was studied from four perspectives: physical health (diarrhea), mental health, people’s personal housing priorities, and significance outside low-income areas. In practice, the role of WASH was scrutinized with tools of quantitative analysis (Paper I), psychology frameworks (Paper II), empirical microbiology (Paper III), and qualitative interview analysis (Paper IV). 

In our comprehensive statistical analysis on Brazil (Paper I), we found that solid waste management was more strongly associated with severe diarrhea compared to WASH. This is in contrast with the international consensus. Moreover, if overall health means “physical, mental and social wellbeing” (WHO, 1948), also the potential mental health consequences of inadequate WASH should be considered. In Paper II, we found that perceived inequality of drinking water services may cause more stress compared to worry about getting sick due to dirty drinking water. Additionally, the views of WASH field professionals can significantly affect what water treatment methods are used at the local level (Paper IV). 

The Russian full-scale war in Ukraine has made resource-efficient water treatment more significant in Europe than in decades. In Paper III, we found that the extremely simple solar drinking water disinfection (SODIS) also works in cold climates and is thus a potential method for Ukraine or Finland. In SODIS, microbiologically contaminated water is treated by simply leaving water out in the sun for example in regular soda bottles. 

In conclusion, WASH should be prioritized more context-specifically and managed more widely to achieve maximal health.

Keywords: water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH); low- and middle-income countries (LMIC); solar disinfection (SODIS); information dissemination; environmental psychology; waste management

Thesis available for public display 10 days prior to the defence at: https://aaltodoc.aalto.fi/doc_public/eonly/riiputus/

Contact information of doctoral student: Anni Juvakoski, anni.juvakoski@aalto.fi

Doctoral theses of the School of Engineering: https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-64-1664-9
 

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