{"id":44336,"date":"2024-01-01T05:02:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-01T05:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adra.org\/?p=44336"},"modified":"2026-04-13T20:43:05","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T20:43:05","slug":"the-fight-against-open-defecation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/the-fight-against-open-defecation","title":{"rendered":"La lutte contre la d\u00e9f\u00e9cation \u00e0 l'air libre"},"content":{"rendered":"

Changing long-held beliefs in the community of Mandahazo, in the Commune of Lazarivo, was not easy. Many people believed that latrines were connected to evil spirits that could harm children, making open defecation a common practice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cConvaincre les gens d'utiliser des latrines a \u00e9t\u00e9 tr\u00e8s difficile. Lorsqu'on leur demandait pourquoi ils d\u00e9f\u00e9quaient \u00e0 l'air libre, ils nous r\u00e9pondaient que garder les excr\u00e9ments entre quatre murs \u00e9tait tabou et attirait le diable\u201d, explique Lambo Jean Mahafetsy, agent de sant\u00e9 communautaire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the ASOTRY project, diarrhea-related deaths were common. “Before, the village was very dirty. In many spots of the village, there was always a risk of walking on feces. Yet the water we drank was not far from the area where we defecated. That is why so many children died of diarrhea,” says Jean Rabemananjara, in charge of hygiene.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To address this, the ASOTRY project, through Action Intercoop\u00e9ration Madagascar (AIM), introduced sanitation and hygiene activities, including Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Project teams worked closely with the community to raise awareness about the dangers of open defecation. “We take them to the areas where they defecate, and then we ask them if they would like to eat next to the place, and they start to be disgusted. Then we explain that flies carry microbes from their feces to their food, which is the source of the diseases such as diarrhea that killed their children\u2026 this is how we convinced them,\u201d explained Lambo Jean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over time, attitudes began to change. Families started building latrines and cleaning up open defecation areas, some of which were later turned into cassava fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCertains projets avaient d\u00e9j\u00e0 construit des latrines, mais personne ne les avait utilis\u00e9es. C'est ASOTRY qui nous a convaincus d'abandonner nos mauvaises pratiques... Les maladies commencent \u00e0 diminuer \u201c, explique Lamboharimana Gilbert, un autre agent de sant\u00e9 communautaire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Building latrines was not always easy. “We encountered some difficulties during the construction of the latrines, because we live on rocky land. Sometimes, we dig only 50cm, and we hit a rock. But it did not discourage us. Finally, our village has today about 40 latrines in total,” says Lamboharimana Gilbert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
After careful review and verification by local authorities and the ASOTRY project, Mandahazo village was officially declared Open Defecation Free (ODF). In total, 40 latrines were built through the efforts of Lambo Jean and other community health volunteers.<\/figcaption><\/figure>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Convaincre la communaut\u00e9 de Mandahazo, commune de Lazarivo, d'abandonner la pratique de la d\u00e9f\u00e9cation \u00e0 l'air libre a \u00e9t\u00e9 un v\u00e9ritable d\u00e9fi. La croyance veut que les latrines soient li\u00e9es \u00e0 des esprits mal\u00e9fiques qui tuent les enfants.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44337,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_eb_attr":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[785,615,819,829,336],"tags":[869,1026,500],"class_list":["post-44336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa","category-blog","category-madagascar","category-voices","category-wash","tag-adra-international-project","tag-asotry-project","tag-usaid"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44336"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47907,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336\/revisions\/47907"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}