As someone living in the Global North in a developed nation, I often take for granted the ability to wash my hands and drink clean water from my tap. When COVID-19 made it to the United States in the late winter of 2020, I did not have to worry about how I would wash my hands or clean household surfaces. Yet many people around the world could not say the same. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has illuminated and exacerbated massive injustices in communities globally—from access to healthcare to gaps in children’s education. One issue that I would like to highlight is the inequality of access to safe water globally. Moreover, how might international human rights law better protect water and sanitation access?

WATER, SANITATION, AND HYGIENE (WASH) 

Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) have incredibly important roles in preventing the spread of the coronavirus. WASH services include access to clean drinking water, safe toilets, rubbish collection, sanitary products for women and girls, and cleaning products. When these services are not available in a community, it makes people vulnerable to the spread of disease, increases the infant and maternal mortality rates, and can even impact equal education opportunities for girls. Not only can WASH services help limit the spread of COVID-19, they can also help in fostering greater gender equality. 

Communities without access to water are some of the most vulnerable. They are often the same communities that do not have adequate access to healthcare, education, and jobs. In many developing nations, in rural and urban areas alike, access to clean water is limited. In highly populated slums in India, women and girls face harassment and abuse when attempting to use public WASH facilities including toilets and public taps. In rural sub-Saharan Africa, women are largely responsible for fetching water, which can be a dangerous and exhausting endeavour. Many developing nations, often with histories of colonisation, do not have the infrastructure to provide their citizens with adequate water access. 

This is not to say that developed nations have universal access to safe drinking water. One can look to Flint, Michigan in the United States to observe how the right to safe water is not being fulfilled in one of the most developed nations in the world. Flint is an example of an overwhelmingly low-income and Black community being neglected when it comes to access to safe water. Additionally, Black women, as the caretakers in their communities, were in particular adversely affected by the Flint crisis, having to mobilise to protect their children and themselves from toxic water. As Amanda Hooper from the National Women’s Law Institute argues, environmental justice issues are inherently feminist issues.  

To put this in the context of COVID-19, we must examine how these injustices are being exacerbated by the virus. COVID-19 has severely impacted women globally. Women living in poverty are especially impacted, from an increase in unpaid care labour to gaps in girls’ education. Domestic abuse has also been in the spotlight as the pandemic forces people indoors and traps women in homes with their abusers. All of these injustices are interconnected, one often exacerbating the others. Women’s access to water and sanitation cannot be isolated from other global injustices simultaneously occurring with COVID-19.

ROLE OF HUMAN RIGHTS LAW IN ADDRESSING WASH ACCESS AND GENDER INJUSTICES 

International human rights law is one source we may look to in addressing the inadequate access to WASH services during COVID-19 and its disproportionate toll on women and girls. In 2010, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly asserted that water was necessary for a dignified life. The UN Human Rights Council reiterated this assertion in its 2010 Resolution 15/9 entitled “Human rights and access to safe drinking water and sanitation”. 

Furthermore, international treaties like the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) highlight how water and sanitation services are crucial to achieving gender equality. Article 14 of CEDAW specifically outlines the rights of rural women, and states that states parties must ensure rural women have the right “to enjoy adequate living conditions in relation to housing, sanitation, electricity and water supply, transport and communications” (emphasis added). I argue, however, that these rights must be expanded to all women, irrespective of whether they live in urban or rural areas or anywhere in between. Although rural development is an important part of expanding access to WASH services, many cities continue to struggle with providing safe drinking water and sanitation. 

Other international treaties that reference WASH services include: the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). Article 24(2)(c) of the CRC states that parties must ensure that children enjoy the “highest attainable standard of health,” which includes combating “disease and malnutrition, including within the framework of primary health care, through (…) the provision of adequate nutritious foods and clean drinking water”. In light of COVID-19, combating and preventing disease has become increasingly important. The CRPD also makes explicit reference to clean drinking water in article 28(2)(a) in which it provides that states must “ensure equal access by persons with disabilities to clean water services”.

WASH, GENDER AND FUTURE CRISES

In examining these treaties, it becomes clear that WASH services are crucial to enjoying other human rights. WASH services also help to protect the most vulnerable from disease, like COVID-19, by allowing access to clean water and sanitation that can stop the spread. However, enforcing the right to water and sanitation continues to be a difficult feat and must become a focal point for human rights if we are to prevent further pandemics.

Times of crisis, like a pandemic, can take a catastrophic toll on the world, but a crisis also presents nations with an opportunity to enact necessary change. COVID-19 presents a prime occasion to bring discussions around the intersection of water and gender to the forefront of human rights scholarship. If we improve access to water and sanitation globally, would we not all be better off when the next pandemic hits our globalised world? Even in the absence of a global pandemic, water access is crucial to one’s enjoyment of other human rights. With an impending climate emergency, it is crucial to further examine water rights, especially in connection with women’s rights, so that humanity is better prepared for the next natural disaster that is upon us.

Maggie Murphy is a LL.M. Human Rights Law candidate at Queen's University Belfast and received her Bachelor's in Political Science from Loyola University Maryland. Her academic and research interests lie at the intersection of feminism, human rights, and climate change.

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