{"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\/pt\/the-fight-against-open-defecation","title":{"rendered":"A luta contra a defeca\u00e7\u00e3o a c\u00e9u aberto"},"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

\u201cConvencer as pessoas a usar uma latrina tem sido muito dif\u00edcil. Quando pergunt\u00e1mos \u00e0s pessoas porque \u00e9 que defecavam ao ar livre, disseram-nos que manter as fezes entre quatro paredes era tabu e atra\u00eda o diabo\u201d, diz Lambo Jean Mahafetsy, Agente Comunit\u00e1rio de Sa\u00fade.<\/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

\u201cAlguns projectos j\u00e1 tinham constru\u00eddo algumas latrinas, mas ningu\u00e9m as tinha utilizado. Foi a ASOTRY que nos convenceu a abandonar as nossas m\u00e1s pr\u00e1ticas... As doen\u00e7as est\u00e3o a come\u00e7ar a diminuir\u201c, diz Lamboharimana Gilbert, outro Agente Comunit\u00e1rio de Sa\u00fade.<\/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":"

Convencer a comunidade de Mandahazo, comuna de Lazarivo, a abandonar a pr\u00e1tica da defeca\u00e7\u00e3o ao ar livre foi um verdadeiro desafio. Existe aqui a cren\u00e7a de que as latrinas est\u00e3o ligadas a esp\u00edritos malignos que matam as crian\u00e7as.<\/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\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44336"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47907,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44336\/revisions\/47907"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adra.org\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}