RB and Save the Children launch productsto reduce child deaths from diarrhoea
New Delhi. 25 March 2015
The global partnership between RB and Save the Children today launched a unique and ground-breaking programme to help eradicate child deaths from diarrhoea.
The partnership unveiled two innovative new hygiene and sanitation products by RB (formerly known as Reckitt Benckiser) alongside Save the Children’s sustainable Stop Diarrhoea programme in India, Pakistan and Nigeria – aimed at preventing, controlling and treating the unnecessary killer.
The combination of RB’s expertise in product development and research, and Save the Children’s experience of delivering life-saving work will help save thousands of young lives a year. Funded by RB, the Stop Diarrhoea programme, will for the first time fully implement the World Health Organisation and UNICEF 7-point plan to ensure comprehensive diarrhoea control.
Each year 567,000 children under-five die needlessly from diarrhoea, equivalent to 64 children every hour. In an ambitious drive to help end this, Save the Children and RB have committed to working with national governments and other partners to implement the 7 Point Plan. To improve hand washing and community sanitation, RB and 19 of their suppliers (who volunteered their time) have developed two unique products that are completely new to market.
The products are a low-cost germ protection bar that can be used by families for cleaning and washing hands (including children from the age of one). Two years in the making, the second is a ‘game-changing’ toilet powder to make the use of pit latrines more hygienic. The powder keeps flies away, reduces both faecal matter and the transmission of germs. The benefits of the toilet powder should encourage communities to make better use of the more hygienic pit latrines, as opposed to defecating in public areas.
For the first time, RB will not be making a profit from these products and the revenue will be reinvested into the Stop Diarrhoea programme and fighting diarrhoea. They will also be produced locally, encouraging entrepreneurship, in addition to reducing the overall carbon footprint and transport costs associated with their manufacture.
The two unique products are major breakthroughs in science and technology to target specific issues and save lives. Both products have been created to be affordable for consumers who have not traditionally been able to afford personal and home hygiene products.
Toilet Powder:
– The fragranced powder has highly absorptive qualities and also has a well-balanced combination of micro-organisms that accelerate the natural and continuous degradation of faeces reducing the need to regularly empty pit latrines and making them more hygienic. Initial tests show significant volume reduction after only one week’s usage.
– Highly biodegradable the powder has been developed combining natural raw material from food production waste, such as rice husk and coconut peat.
– The citrus fragrance reduces the unpleasant odours which also results in a reduction of flies and pests which use the toilets as a food source, spreading disease.
Affordable Germ Protection Bar:
– Has been developed as a product to be used by families to wash themselves, their children, (safe from children from the age of 1 year)
– Requires less water so effective even when reduced access to water
– Contains ingredients that help in moisturising the skin and reduces the transmission of disease-causing germs
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