One billion people still defecate in public despite health risks-UN

(Reuters) - (Note: Strong language in the second paragraph)

One billion people worldwide still practice "open defecation" and they need to be told that this leads to the spread of fatal diseases, U.N. experts said on Thursday at the launch of a study on drinking water and sanitation.

"'Excreta', 'faeces', 'poo', I could even say 'shit' maybe, this is the root cause of so many diseases," said Bruce Gordon, acting coordinator for sanitation and health at the World Health Organization.

Societies that practice open defecation - putting them at risk from cholera, diarrhea, dysentery, hepatitis A and typhoid - tend to have large income disparities and the world's highest numbers of deaths of children under 5 years old.

Attempts to improve sanitation among the poorest have long focused on building latrines, but the United Nations says that money literally went down the toilet. Attitudes, not infrastructure, need to change, it said.