South Sudan

In recent outbreak settings, the use of rapid response teams (RRTs) to support the WASH sector has increased.
RRTs have been used as part of the response to cholera outbreaks in countries such as Haiti, Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with the scope of these teams varying widely. As the
presence of RRTs becomes more common in outbreak settings, it is important to better understand and document
the different types of models in use.

Background: Refugees are at high risk for communicable diseases due to overcrowding and poor water, sanitation,
and hygiene conditions. Handwashing with soap removes pathogens from hands and reduces disease risk. A
hepatitis E outbreak in the refugee camps of Maban County, South Sudan in 2012 prompted increased hygiene
promotion and improved provision of soap, handwashing stations, and latrines. We conducted a study 1 year after

The Lifesaver Cube (‘the Cube’) is a household water filter developed in collaboration with Oxfam. Dirty water is stored inside the Cube, which resembles a tough five litre jerry can. The small pump on the cap is used to increase the pressure inside the Cube, forcing water through an internal membrane filter which removes bacteria, viruses and other pathogens.

Objective To investigate the concentration of residual chlorine in drinking water supplies in refugee camps, South Sudan, March–April 2013. Methods For each of three refugee camps, we measured physical and chemical characteristics of water supplies at four points after distribution: (i) directly from tapstands; (ii) after collection; (iii) after transport to households; and (iv) after several hours of household storage.

The Sawyer PointOne household hollow fiber membrane filter (PointOne) efficaciously removes microbiological indicators in the laboratory, and is increasingly considered for emergency response. To our knowledge, PointOne effectiveness in emergencies had not been evaluated. In South Sudan, 773 PointOnes were distributed.

As  an  alternative,  CLTS  can  appear  fundamentally  mismatched  with  post-emergency  and  fragile  states  contexts:  the  core  principle  that  sanitation  hardware  should  not  be  subsidised  can  conflict  with  urgent  need,  and  with  what  some  will  view  as  a  contravention  to  the  right  of  human  assistance.  Affected  populations  have  often  lost  all  their  wealth,  and  are  traumatised,  physically  weak,  insecure,  and  at  the  point  of  greatest  dependency  on  the  aid  community.  Furthermore,  the  least  able  memb

Mainstreaming gender in an emergency water and sanitation (WatSan) response can be difficult as standard consultations and participation processes take too much time. To facilitate a rapid response that includes women's needs, a simple Gender and Sanitation Tool has been developed that can also be used by less experienced staff. The tool is a step-by-step guide on how to collect required data to define design parameters for sanitation facilities, based on ad hoc consultations with women who will be their users.

The provision of safe water in adequate quantities is a basic necessity in emergencies to prevent the transmission of infectious diseases, and more specifically, the spread of waterborne diseases. The reliance of pre-treatment steps and bulk chlorination have been the main ways of achieving water quality standards, but here are still knowledge gaps in the field of practice.

This article presents the experience of using the Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) approach in a recent programme in Somalia and explains some of the adaptations that were necessary to adjust to the specifics of a fragile and insecure context. The article goes on to explore the applicability of CLTS in fragile and insecure contexts more generally, using examples from South Sudan, Chad, and Afghanistan, and argues that in some ways it is an ideal approach for overcoming some of the challenges of working in these areas.

In this paper, we argue for including a full hygiene promotion intervention as an early part of emergency response. In an internally displaced persons (IDP) camp in Bentiu, Republic of South Sudan, it has proven to be a strong complement to the construction of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities and WASH non-food item (NFI) distribution. Comparison between two camps with and without hygiene promotion intervention was made possible by the difficulty in recruiting hygiene promoters in one of the two camps.