Lack of toilets costs India $54 billion a year: World Bank

World Bank says India loses 6.4% of GDP through hygiene-related illnesses, lost productivity and poor sanitation.

NEW DELHI: Lack of toilets and other proper sanitation facilities costs India nearly $54 billion a year, a World Bank study has found, mainly through premature deaths, especially of young children.

Asia's third-largest economy loses $53.8 billion or 6.4 per cent of its gross domestic product through hygiene-related illnesses, lost productivity and other factors stemming from poor sanitation, according to World Bank.

"For decades we have been aware of the significant health impacts of inadequate sanitation in India," said Christopher Juan Costain, leader for the World Bank's South Asia Water and Sanitation Program.

"This report quantifies the economic losses to India, and shows that children and poor households bear the brunt of poor sanitation," he said in remarks posted on the group's website on Tuesday.

The lack of proper sanitation creates major health risks, raising the threat of potentially fatal illnesses such as typhoid and malaria.

The study in East Asia showed annual per person losses from poor sanitation in the range of $9.3 in Vietnam, to $16.8 in the Philippines, $28.6 in Indonesia to a high of $32.4 in Cambodia, said Costain.

"In contrast, India lost $48 on a per capita basis, showing the urgency with which India needs to improve sanitation," he said.

Earlier this year, a UN study found far more people in India have access to a mobile phone than to a toilet.

India's mobile subscribers totalled around 700 million at the last count, enough to serve more than half of the country's 1.2 billion population. But just 366 million people, around a third of the population, had access to proper sanitation, said the study.

The World Bank report said early deaths and other health-related impacts of inadequate sanitation such as cost of treatment for illnesses such as diarrhoea, malaria and intestinal worms, cost India $38.5 billion.

This was followed by productive time lost, as people seek out proper sanitation facilities or places to defecate, at $10.7 billion.

India's government calculates fewer than 30 percent of villagers in rural areas have access to toilets.