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on the human right to safe drinking water andsanitation, Catarina de Albuquerque, reportedthat in her mission to Senegal in 2012 she visitedfamilies ‘where the water connection tap was closedwith a padlock in order to control consumption.Women and children complained about the lack ofwater for personal hygiene and housekeeping; insome cases, the key to the lock was held by the malehead of the household’. 245Realizing women’s rights to water and sanitationrequires attention to decisions about who getswater for which purposes, who gets access tosanitation and how wastewater from sanitation istreated and disposed of, all of which reflect powerdynamics and political prioritization. Existing dataare insufficient to give a full picture of these issues.Most information about water and sanitation isgathered through household surveys, which do notdisaggregate based on sex for most issues. This canmask intra-household inequalities. 246 The SpecialRapporteur has suggested that household surveysshould be amended to capture these inequalities ‘byfocusing on the actual use of water, sanitation andhygiene by all individuals within a household’. Shehas also urged for specific efforts to measure ‘theability of all women and adolescent girls to managemenstruation hygienically and with dignity’. 247Collecting data on the actual use of water andsanitation facilities at public places, such as schoolsand hospitals, is also crucial for building a betterunderstanding of whether women and girls are ableto enjoy this right.Inadequate access to water and sanitationjeopardizes women’s healthApart from constituting a human rights violation initself, the lack of adequate water and sanitationindirectly limits women’s enjoyment of rangeof other rights, such as those to education andhealth and to live free from violence. One of themajor obstacles to girls’ education in developingcountries, for example, is the lack of sanitationfacilities that allow adolescent girls to deal withmenstruation.Ill health caused by the lack of adequate waterand sanitation increases the need to care for sickfamily members, a responsibility that falls primarilyon women and girls. Women are also susceptibleto greater health risks from certain water andsanitation-related diseases because of their caringrole. For instance, trachoma, an infectious eyedisease that can lead to blindness, spreads easily inovercrowded conditions and where there is a lack ofsafe water and sanitation. 248 The disease affects 2.2million people worldwide. Women have been shownto be 1.8 times more likely than men to be infectedbecause, as primary carers for the sick, they are morelikely to be in close contact with infected individuals. 249Menstruation, pregnancy and pregnancyrelatedconditions, as well as taboos and stigmassurrounding these, mean that safe water andadequate sanitation facilities are particularlyimportant for women. During labour and childbirth,a hygienic environment, including safe water andsanitation, is paramount for the survival and healthof both mother and child. 250 Obstetric fistula—apregnancy-related complication affecting 2 millionwomen in Africa and Asia—leads to incontinenceand in turn to social stigmatization as well as severehealth problems. Lack of access to water andsanitation reinforces the stigma against women, whoneed to wash and bathe frequently. 251Meanwhile, latrines continue to be constructedwithout facilities or spaces for women to washthemselves and use their sanitary method of choice,and they frequently provide no means for disposalof sanitary products. In addition, sanitary napkinsare often unavailable or unaffordable because theyare not considered essential commodities withinhealth systems and may have to be imported. In theirabsence, women and girls are often forced to useunhygienic sanitary methods, such as rags, dirt, ashor newspaper.Women generally place higher priority than menon having a toilet in the home and require moreprivacy in order to attend to their needs. However,179