Increased access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene services in remote and underserved communitites in Kabul and Laghman provinces The project aims at decreasing mortality and morbidity of vulnerable persons from remote and underserved communities by working directly with communities and through health facilities on improvement of preparedness and response mechanisms to communicable diseases outbreaks. This will be achieved by focusing on rehabilitation and construction of the most critical WASH facilities in 11 targeted communities in Kabul and Laghman provinces - water systems and storage, sanitation facilities, waste management systems and hand washing stations in HFs – by Risk Communication and Community Engagement activities conducted at health facilities level and strengthening IPC measures on community level. Rehabilitation and construction works will focus on meeting Sphere standards, ensuring equal access to facilities by male and female beneficiaries, as well as persons with different disabilities. All female toilets will be equipped with necessary menstrual hygiene materials which will be then disposed in a safe way. All the works will be also accompanied by soft components - relevant health facilities staff will be trained on operation and maintenance of newly rehabilitated and constructed systems as well as on elements of water quality assurance and water testing. Each of the facility will be then equipped with basic free residual chlorine testing devices and necessary reagents. 
Additionally, PU-AMI Health and Hygiene Education Teams (HHET) will review each health facility standard operating procedures, skills and knowledge of persons responsible for Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) and provide capacity building on the topic. Strengthening infection prevention and control measures in 11 facilities will be done through trainings to respective IPC focal points in each facility, provision of necessary equipment (disinfection and cleaning materials, personnel protective equipment for cleaners), design and implementation of tailored CV-19 and other communicable diseases IEC materials to be used during health and hygiene education sessions by health care staff. 
Risk Communication and Community Engagement (RCCE) activities will be integrated by each HF staff as a part of their regular duties (doctors, nurses, midwives during consultations) PU-AMI HHET teams will help HF staff in the inclusion of RCCE in the course of their consultations, design and put up IEC adapted for different groups and also organize awareness sessions in the HFs periodically. The main aim of RCCE will be to ensure correct and precise information is provided to the community members on hygiene- hand washing with soap, respiratory hygiene, water storage and treatment as well as CV-19 symptoms, prevention and response. To ensure RCCE messages and methodology are appropriate to health facility patients, at the beginning of the project, PU-AMI accountability and program teams will conduct series of focus group discussions (FGD) with health facility patients to consult the most relevant RCCE approach. The education activities will be also accompanied by distribution of menstrual hygiene items for female beneficiaries. In targeted communities PU-AMI will additionally install handwashing stations in key public spaces (e.g. at mosques, schools) to ensure communities can practice hand hygiene and contribute to decrease in communicable diseases spread.
This will contribute to better preparedness of communities in remote areas to respond to potential communicable disease outbreak - health facilities by having improved WASH and IPC systems, communities by being well informed about the hygiene and health related topics, that can protect them from infection.
To effectively measure impact of the RCCE component PU-AMI MEAL team will conduct baseline and endline KAP survey which will provide information on communities knowledge and practices before and after project implementation. PU-AMI will liaise with AAP and RCCE WGs to ensure the survey is part of the assessment inventory.