Safe drinking water is a basic human right, essential to realizing all human rights

But where a child is born often determines whether or not his or her drinking water is safe! In Canada and the U.S., almost everyone has access to safe drinking water. In contrast, the proportion in . . . 

• Nigeria is 19%
• Liberia is 25%
• Haiti is 52%
• Kenya is 58%

The situation is almost always worse in rural areas. We in the wealthy "Western world" have a moral and biblical responsibility to help our struggling neighbours in Africa and Haiti.

 

Unsafe water is a leading cause of disease and death

• The World Health Organization says at least 1.7 billion (or almost one in four) people on our planet are drinking water each day contaminated by feces, and one million people are dying each year from diarrheal diseases caused by contaminated water and inadequate sanitation and hygiene. Someone – usually a child – is dying every 30 seconds.
• The diarrheal diseases that dirty water transmits include cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and polio.
• In Africa, nearly half of the people throughout the entire continent lack access to safe water, and adequate sanitation facilities.
• The United Nations has included water and sanitation among its Development Goals -- insisting that everyone on the planet should have access by 2030 to safe water for drinking and hand-washing, plus toilets

 Women and girls bear the daily burden of gathering water

 

• • Dirty water transmits diarrheal diseases such as cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and polio
  • Women and children around the world spend 200 million hours a year collecting water, says UNICEF, calling it a "colossal waste of time"
  • Water jugs are heavy, causing fatigue, musculoskeletal damage and early degenerative bone and soft tissue damage over time
  • Hauling water leaves girls with less time and energy than boys to attend and do well in school
  • Many girls drop out of school to help at home, increasingly the likelihood that they will remain impoverished
• Hauling water from distant sources, often in the dark, leaves women and girls vulnerable to assaults and rape

 

Sub-Saharan Africans have the greatest water need, least ability to meet it

• Two thirds of sub-Saharan African countries rank among the world's lowest in the Human Development Index which gauges the potential for a nation's people to live long and healthy life, be knowledgeable, and have a decent standard of living
• Half of the people in sub-Saharan African countries live on less than $1 per day
• Only 30% of sub-Saharan Africans have access to adequate sanitation, which is only a four-percentage-point improvement since 1990, whereas 90% of northern Africans have access