PAN American Health Organisation (PAHO) poster winner, 10 year-old Reeshema Ball yesterday encouraged her peers to rebel against accepting unsanitary living conditions and to instead protest their right to a healthy environment.

“Boys and girls, we need to rebel and be different,” the young girl said passionately. “We need to say that we have the right to safe water, no matter how poor we are. We need to say to our authorities that sanitation is dignity and that is something we demand.”

She was speaking at celebrations held to launch World Health Day at the Women’s Resource and Outreach Centre at 47 Beechwood Avenue in Kingston. The theme was ‘Healthy Environments For Children’.

“We need to say enough is enough — enforce the law, protect our waters, soil and air from industrial pollution. We need to say that we need safe areas to play and grow,” Ball said to her peers. “But we need to work hard too, it is not only talking. We can show them that we can be the example; say no to the cigarette, forget it. It is not cool to smoke. No to playing with dirty water, it has bacteria, it is dangerous.”

According to PAHO, almost five million children die from diseases related to their environment every year; and diarrhoea is the second biggest child killer in the world.

During yesterday’s ceremony, PAHO representative, Manuel Pena launched the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) programme. WASH is part of a global campaign to draw attention to the plight of more than 2.4 billion people who are without adequate sanitation and the 1.2 billion without access to a safe water supply.

A major part of the programme is aimed at encouraging more frequent handwashing which, it is estimated, can reduce diarrhoeal diseases by a third.

At yesterday’s function, Education Minister Maxine Henry-Wilson made a symbolic gesture by washing the hands of Jason Paris from the Albert Reid Basic School in the Lyndhurst area.

The Lyndhurst/Beechwood community in Kingston will be one of three to benefit from the WASH project in its start-up stage. Over six schools from the community attended the function.

Ball also took advantage of the gathering to make a plea for an end to the violence in Jamaica.

“We need to say to daddy and uncle that the violence has to stop. We want to live in peace with one another,” she said. “No to the gun. It is killing our families, our communities. We are part of the environment and the environment is part of us. Let us live together. It will be beautiful harmony.”

Ministry of Health figures from December 2001 to February 2002 showed that there were 67 violence related injuries to children over the period. Slightly over 50 per cent of the victims were between the ages of five to nine years old. Almost 27 per cent of the children were in the 10 to 12 age range, while 16 per cent were in the one to four age group. There were six children under a year old with violence related injuries.

Ball chided adults for the poor job they were doing in raising their children.

“I have heard people saying ‘the children of today will be the adults of tomorrow’, but what kind of adults will we be? Just like the adults of today? It is frightening!” she said. “The environment in which we live is not quite happy. It is abused by the actions of today’s adults and we, the children, are growing among those things. And if we don’t make an effort we will not be better than them.’