Save Our Water

Every day, thousands of people die from lack of access to clean water. According to Water.org fact sheets, only 62% of the world’s population has access to improved sanitation — defined as a sanitation facility that ensures hygienic separation of human excreta from human contact. The majority of illness in the world is caused by fecal matter. In addition, also according to Water.org fact sheets, every 15 seconds, a child dies from a water-related disease and children in poor environments often carry 1,000 parasitic worms in their bodies at any time.

Of all the water on earth, 97.5% is salt water, and of the remaining 2.5% fresh water, about 70% is frozen in the polar icecaps. The remaining 30% is moisture in the soil or lies in underground aquifers. Only about 0.0007% of the world’s fresh water is readily accessible for human use.

Without water, life would not exist, yet nearly one billion people lack access to clean water. More than twice that amount don’t have access to toilets.

Clean water is something we take for granted in most developed nations. But just 100 years ago, cities like New York and Paris were centers of infectious disease. In the end, it was sweeping reforms in water and sanitation that enabled human and economic development to leap forward. In fact, a poll by the British Medical Journal in 2007 found that clean water and sanitation were the most important medical advances since 1840.

According to a fact sheet from Water.org, a not for profit clean water advocacy group, the health and economic impacts of today’s global water crisis are staggering.

1. More than 3.5 million people die each year from water-related disease; 84 percent are children. Nearly all deaths, 98 percent, occur in the developing world.
2. Lack of access to clean water and sanitation kills children at a rate equivalent of a jumbo jet crashing every four hours.
3. Lack of sanitation is the world’s biggest cause of infection.
4. Millions of women and children spend several hours each day collecting water from distant, often polluted sources. This is time not spent working at an income-generating job, caring for family members, or attending school.
5. 443 million school days are lost each year due to water-related illness.

Industrialized nations now have the know how to bring people clean water and improved sanitation. But global leaders are still sitting on their hands waiting for a magic cure to the clean water problem. Simple and economical solutions are available, yet millions will die this year from lack of access to clean water and lack of any water at all. This has to change.