A sanitation worker is a person responsible for cleaning, maintaining, operating, or emptying the equipment or technology at any step of the sanitation chain. This is the definition used in the narrower sense within the WASH sector. More broadly speaking, sanitation workers may also be involved in cleaning streets, parks, public spaces, sewers, stormwater drains and public toilets. Another definition is: "The moment an individual’s waste is outsourced to another, it becomes sanitation work." Those workers who maintain and empty on-site sanitation systems contribute to functional fecal sludge management systems. It is important to safeguard the dignity and health of sanitation workers. Without sanitation workers, the Sustainable Development Goal 6, Target 6.2 cannot be achieved. Some organisations use the term specifically for municipal solid waste collectors, whereas others exclude the workers involved in management of solid waste sector from its definition.
Definition
A report by World Bank, International Labour Organization, WaterAid and WHO from 2019 defines "sanitation workers" to include toilet cleaners and caretakers in domestic, public, and institutional settings; those who empty pits from pit latrines and vaults of septic tanks and other fecal sludge handlers; those who clean sewers and manholes; and those who work at sewage treatment plants and fecal sludge treatment plants and disposal sites. In the United States however, some organisations use the term exclusively for municipal solid waste collectors. A famous example of "sanitation worker" referring to waste collectors is the Memphis Sanitation Workers’ Strike in 1968, supported by Martin Luther King Jr., which brought together both waste collectors and sewerage maintenance workers. Another definition is: "The moment an individual’s waste is outsourced to another, it becomes sanitation work." Since there are various definitions of sanitation, it is not surprising that there are various definitions of "sanitation worker".
Types of sanitation work
Related terms
More generally, a waste collector deals with municipal solid waste. In some countries, human excrement is still collected from certain types of toilet without mechanical equipment and without personal protective equipment. These workers are "scooping out feces from ‘dry’ latrines and overflowing pits". They are usually working in the informal labour sector and are commonly referred to as or 'illegal emptiers'. They are subjected to social stigma for their work in manually emptying septic tanks and pit latrines.
injuries related to the physical effort of extracting and transporting the waste, including falls from height
injuries related to cuts from non-fecal waste disposed of down the toilet
the dangers of working in confined spaces, including lack of oxygen
One specific disease that concerns workers in sewers is Leptospirosis, spread through contact with raturine
Social challenges
In developing countries, low-grade, unskilled sanitation workers often face social stigma and discrimination. This is especially true when sanitation is linked to a caste-based structure and often allocated to castes perceived to be lower in the caste hierarchy, such as in India and Bangladesh. This stigma can result in intergenerational discrimination, where children of sanitation workers often struggle to escape the vicious cycle of limited opportunities and sanitation work.. There can be implicit or explicit discrimination, which hinders workers’ social inclusion, their opportunities to shift careers, and social mobility. Furthermore, alcoholism and drug addiction to evade the working conditions are common among some sanitation workers in developing countries.
In India the term manual scavengers is used historically for a subsection of sanitation workers. The official definition in Indian law is "manually cleaning, carrying, disposing of, or otherwise handling, [human excreta">Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit">German Corporation for International Cooperation GmbH, have been working on projects to "legalise and make sanitation workers more visible and create the recognition and respect that they so rightfully deserve."
In India the term manual scavengers is used historically for a subsection of sanitation workers. The official definition in Indian law is "manually cleaning, carrying, disposing of, or otherwise handling, [human excreta in an insanitary latrine or in an open drain or pit". The practice has officially been banned since 1993 but still continues. Sanitation workers in India who clean streets may also be called "street sweepers". It has been stated that sanitation workers in India are "overwhelmingly Dalits, and are in fact from ‘scavenging castes’". “Sanitation workers” can be used as a translation for the Hindi word "safai karamcharis". This includes "manual scavengers", but also people who work as sweepers, are employed to clean streets and open spaces, collect solid waste, and clean open drains and public toilets. Another commonly used term is "Pourakarmikas" which includes manual scavengers, sewer workers, sanitation workers. An estimate in 2018 put the number of "sanitation workers" in India at 5 million, and 50% of them being women.
In European history the terms "nightsoil collectors" or "nightmen" and gong farmers were used. Towns with sanitation systems based on pail closets relied on frequent emptying, performed by workers driving "honeywagons", a precursor to the vacuum truck now used to pump out septage from septic tanks. The municipal emptying of pail toilets continued in Australia into the second half of the twentieth century; these were known as dunnies and the workers were dunnymen.
Society and culture
Income
Sanitation Workers typically earn an average monthly salary of $2,226 in the United States, although this figure can vary widely between states. For instance, the state of New York provides total annual wages of up to $91,336 for Sanitation Workers after 20 years of service.
