Overcrowding, water scarcity make slums vulnerable to Covid-19

If coronavirus hits the slums, it will spread like wildfire.

Talk of self-isolation is a joke; people must work to eat.

The country’s slums lack enough clean water, they are generally filthy, known for 'flying toilets' and generally mired in poverty. A family of six may be jammed into a tiny room next to another family in a tiny room and another and another.

Colds, flu, cholera, measles, Covid-19 all threaten slums.

The 2019 Census indicates there are about 2.5 million slum dwellers in about 200 settlements in Nairobi. This is about 60 per cent of the city’s population.

Out of the 61,651 households who reported access to clean water in Kibra, 45 per cent depend on taps water outside their houses while 17 per cent buy water from vendors.

In Mathare, 27 per cent rely on tap water while 19 per cent buy it. 

Dagoretti and Embakasi constituencies that hold many informal settlements also rely on water vendors at 25 and 20 per cent, respectively.

For a population whose monthly income is less than Sh18,000 a month, such costs are untenable.

Some 42 per cent have flushable toilets in Kibra but without water, while in Mathare, 80 per cent have the toilets but without water.

Huruma resident Jacinta Wanjiru was agitated when her six-year-old son appeared from the kitchen area with a jug of water to wash his hands, for the fifth time.

He picked a piece of soap by the door before stepping out of the house, ignoring his mother’s protests.

“His teacher told him to wash his hands regularly. Now he does it every few minutes and is wasting all the water in the house,” Wanjiku said.

Even though she would like her children to maintain basic handwashing to avoid contracting Covid-19, the mother of three says she cannot afford it.

“This is ridiculous! The government wants us to wash our hands all the time but our taps remain dry most days,” she said.

Wanjiru stays with her children at Ngei 1, in Nairobi’s Huruma estate.

For the last two weeks, she said the area had not received any water and residents were forced to buy it in the neighbouring Mathare North area.

“We are buying water at Sh10 and that is lucky. When there is no water in Mathare North, the prices shoot up to Sh40. Where is the water to wash our hands?” she asked.

Wanjiku said that even though they want to follow all the safety precautions given by the government, their income is unable to sustain it.

“I am paid on commission for my sales work, but my employer asked us to stay at home until the situation gets better. The government then sent back extra mouths, whose food we had already budgeted for and paid the schools,” she said.

She added, “Are we to lock ourselves up in the house and die of hunger? We shall go out there and look for food to feed our children and water to keep clean.”

With a seventh confirmed case of coronavirus in the country, more people are growing anxious, unsure of whom it will hit next.

With most doing manual jobs that cannot be done remotely like masonry, sales, small businesses, cleaning services, hawking, boda boda, Kenya’s army of most financially precarious workers have no alternatives.

“In trying to avoid coronavirus, which we are not certain of contacting, we shall die of hunger. It is a tough choice between two extremes, but I will not sit pretty to escape coronavirus but face hunger,” she said.

Across in Ngei 2, Catherine Achola sat quietly with her two children a few minutes to 2 pm until the younger child broke the silence to ask for lunch. 

“If you had breakfast at 11 am, you can surely wait till dinner time. I have no money for any food right now,” Achola said.

She asked the kids to pray that she makes money early enough so the family can have evening tea and reduce the pangs of hunger before dinner is served.

As she stepped out to go hunt for laundry jobs in Eastleigh area, her daughter called out to remind her that they had run out of water.

For the last three years, Achola said, water has been a challenge in the area.

Most of the times, they get water once a week, on Wednesday night and it’s gone by morning, but sometimes, weeks pass and taps develop rust.

“We buy water, sometimes from as far as Kariobangi because the entire Mathare area goes dry all the way to Mradi, North and Kiamaiko. Do you think I would buy a 20-litre-can of water at Sh40 and wash my hands randomly to keep safe from coronavirus? That is a big joke,” she said.

She admits to understanding how she exposes herself and family to Covid-19 but insists that water has more uses in her household than for washing hands. In fact, for her, that is a waste.

“We wash hands before we eat, that is mandatory. After nature calls, that is okay but not just randomly,” she said.

Alphonse Were who stays in Jonsaga area said lack of water has already placed them in a very vulnerable position.

There are at least 40 people sharing two flushable toilets in the block where he lives. Water scarcity has made it very difficult to keep them clean.

“It is a flushable toilet and that makes things even worse for us. It is impossible to keep a toilet shared by 40 people clean without a regular supply of water,” Were said.

He said the toilet is always left dirty until someone does laundry and uses the left-over water to flush.

Like many other Mathare residents, Were believes coronavirus will only affect the affluent.

"I'm not about to drop the handshake culture, I've probably shaken hands with about 30 people since morning.

“It is our culture to shake hands and so we cannot just stop. We have our hope in God, our protector,” he said.

Were said most people living in the informal settlement are already stretched beyond limits financially and will not be able to sufficiently protect themselves or cater to their treatments should any of them be infected.

The situation is not different in Kibra where it still takes a lot of convincing for many who believe Africans are safe from coronavirus. 

President Uhuru Kenyatta has since directed the Ministry of Health to step up its precautionary measures in informal settlements, to prevent the spread of the disease. 

More than 10 people have died in Africa and left more than 450 were infected as of Wednesday. 

While a good diet, enough sleep and reducing stress levels have been advised to increase our immunity and fight coronavirus, many people living in informal settlements cannot achieve this.

Almost two million children who have been relying on free school meals feeding programmes are now uncertain of three (or two or one) meals a day after learning institutions were closed. 

The President directed specific prevention strategies to take care of low-income and vulnerable populations especially in informal settlements.

Kenya is among countries with a huge gap between the health of the rich and the poor, ranking at position 121 out of 176 countries according to a global report released by World Vision 2018.

Despite having signed up to the Abuja declaration (2001) and committed to allocate 15 per cent of the national GDP on health, the government has consistently allocated less than eght per cent.

This has forced people to pay heavily for health services, the poor being the most affected.

(edited by o. owino)