Handwashing under clean water can cut diarrhea and pneumonia by half, yet eight out of 10 Ghanaian households do not have handwashing facilities due to cost.

The tippy-tap, an innovation which costs next to nothing to build is made up of sticks and empty gallons, is helping many rural dwellers to reverse this trend. 

Progress has been made in Ghana to improve access to clean water sources to 80% of the population and eliminating Guinea worm from the country.

Despite these successes, about 4,000 Ghanaian children still die each year from diarrhea, more die from pneumonia, and about one out of every four Ghanaian children suffer from stunting (chronic malnutrition linked to poor water and sanitation).

The situation makes the achievement of SDG 6 target on water and sanitation hard to reach in a country that did well in attaining many of the Millenium Development Goals.

The tippy-tap could help reverse this if government could invest in such interventions to reach more households.

Watch Justice Baidoo report from Sayoo