Access to Basic Sanitation Services in Kenya by County

Poor sanitation is one of the leading risk factors for death in Kenya, with 9,012 people estimated to die from unsafe water sources annually. Similarly, 7,588 die from unsafe sanitation, and 7,499 die from lack of access to safe handwashing facilities.^[1]

Reducing these deaths requires paying closer attention to sanitation by improving four key indicators: Access to basic sanitation services, access to safely managed sanitation services, access to handwashing facilities that include water and soap, and access to safely managed drinking water services.

How many people die from poor sanitation in Kenya?

Infectious diseases like cholera, typhoid, dysentery, and diarrhea are spread through unsanitary conditions, leading to deaths in many parts of the world, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.

In Kenya, 1.8% of the total deaths in 2021 were attributed to unsafe sanitation, meaning that poor sanitation was an underlying risk factor in these deaths.

Another way to understand the impact of unsafe sanitation is through death rates. In 2021, 27.3 deaths per 100,000 population in Kenya were attributed to unsafe sanitation. These were the number of lives we would save if each individual had access to improved sanitation facilities. 

The majority of Kenyans do not have access to basic sanitation services.

Basic sanitation facilities offer improved sanitation services, such as properly and safely separating excreta without the need for human contact. These facilities are also not shared between households. They include flush or pour toilets connected to a piped sewer or septic tank, composting toilets, and pit latrines with slabs.

In Kenya, however, very few individuals and households have access to this basic level of sanitation. As the chart above shows, the share of the population with access to at least basic sanitation services in 2022 was 36.5%. In urban areas, only 39.8% of the population had access to basic sanitation compared to 35.2% in rural areas.^[2]

A 2019 research brief in Nakuru Town sheds light on why this might happen.^[3] It showed that most residents used unlined pit latrines with sand slabs. Furthermore, 2% of the residents practiced open defecation, and only 31% had access to improved sanitation. 21% of the residents shared a toilet, while only 19% were connected to the piped sewer. These findings reflect the dire state of sanitation in Nakuru Town and other urban and rural areas.

Few people in Kenya use safely managed sanitation services

The management of waste and excrement is essential for improved sanitation services. In Kenya, many households do not have this capability, contributing to their exposure to infectious agents.

A safely managed sanitation service improves sanitation services, separates excreta from human contact, and safely disposes of it on-site or transports and treats it off-site.^[4]

In 2022, only 31.5% of the Kenyan population used a safely managed sanitation service.^[5] Overall, 37.1 million people in Kenya did not use it, meaning they were either openly defecating, using unimproved services where excreta came into contact with humans, or sharing sanitation services like toilets with neighbors.

Additionally, 21.5 million people were not using improved sanitation services or one in which waste is safely separated from human contact.

The problem was much more dire in urban areas, whereby a larger share (33%) of the population did not use a safely managed sanitation service compared to rural areas (27.9%).

As in Nakuru Town, this rural-urban difference can be attributed to the sharing of sanitation services between households in urban areas and the lack of proper handling, disposal, transportation, and waste treatment.^[6]

In rural areas, however, open defecation is much more common and contributes to the poor management of sanitation services.

Very few people in Kenya have access to basic handwashing facilities

Infectious diseases are spread through germs when we fail to clean our hands with water and soap properly. These germs enter our bodies and make us sick. The UNICEF estimates that the risk of getting diarrhea can be reduced by 40% through handwashing with soap and water.^[7]

In 2022, only 37.6% of the population in Kenya had access to basic handwashing facilities, including soap and water.^[8] Overall, 33.71 million people did not have access to basic handwashing facilities. Access was higher in urban areas at 44.8% than in rural areas at 34.6%.

Kenya's level of access is lower than the world average, whereby 72.16% of the population has access to basic handwashing facilities with soap and water.^[9] Most of the counties without this basic access are found in Africa. According to the World Bank, less than half of the population in 42 countries did not have access to basic handwashing facilities. Kenya was one of them.^[10]

The progress toward universal access to sanitation in Kenya has been slow

The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target 6.2 mandates improving access to basic sanitation.^[11] However, progress toward universal access has been slow in Kenya, with little progress made in the last two decades.

For instance, Kenya's access to basic sanitation services increased slightly from 28.1% in 2000 to 36.5% in 2022. Only an additional 8.4% of the population gained access to basic sanitation services in two decades.

Similarly, the share of the population using safely managed sanitation services increased by 7% in two decades, from 24.5% in 2000 to 31.5% in 2022.

The share of the population accessing basic handwashing facilities did not bulge in a decade. In 2011, 37.1% of the population had access to basic handwashing. It increased by 0.5% in a decade to 37.6% in 2022.

Disparities exist between counties in terms of household access to improved sanitation services.

Kenyan data from 2019 observed that 74.5% of households in Kenya had access to improved sanitation services.^[12] However, there were massive disparities between regions.

The share of households with access to improved sanitation services was highest in Nairobi at 96.4%, Kiambu at 96.2%, Kirinyaga at 95.7%, Nyeri at 94.4%, Murang'a at 94.2%, and Nyandarua at 93.1%.

The share of households with improved sanitation was lowest in Turkana at 24.3%, Samburu at 29.6%, Wajir at 29.8%, Mandera at 34.7%, Tana River at 41.8%, Marsabit at 43%, and Garissa at 44.3%.

See Also

1. Households access to electricity by county
2. Wealth and economic wellbeing in Kenya

References