User:JustinePorto/Public toilets in American Samoa

Public toilets in American Samoa are located in museums, restaurants and public squares. Some may be wheelchair accessible. In the past, some have been unsafe. Access to public toilets is an issue faced by people in the region.

Public toilets
Public toilets were mostly available at hotels and restaurants in Apia and Pago Pago. They were also available in some local town centers. Otherwise, they are very uncommon. Public toilets are located in museums, restaurants and public squares. Ones can be found at the Jean P. Haydon Museum. Accessible public toilets were installed at Fale Laumai as part of renovations in 2006 and 2007 that cost USD$3.2 million.

In the 1990s, women were advised not to stay at Herb and Sla's Motel in Fagatogo because it was dangerous to go out many times. Women were advised to lock toilet doors for their own safety. There were two public toilets in Fagatoga in the 1940s. Used by members of the US armed forces, they were unsanitary shaped like horse troughs.

Regional and global situation impacting public toilets in American Samoa
Public toilet access around the world is most acute in the Global South, with around 3.6 billion people, 40% of the world's total population, lacking access to any toilet facilities. 2.3 people in the the Global South do not have toilet facilities in their residence. Despite the fact that the United Nation made a declaration in 2010 that clean water and sanitation is a human right, little has been done in many places towards addressing this on a wider level. German notions of cultural codes around the usage of public toilets has been exported to many parts of the world as a result of German colonialism, but many places in Africa and the Pacific continue to challenge those norms around cleanliness well into the 2010s.

Septic systems and any sewage systems were not strong enough in the 1990s for tampons to be thrown into them.

Homosexual American servicemen sometimes used public toilets in bigger cities in the Pacific during World War II as places to have trysts.