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WHO | Marko Kokic
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The
Deadly Waters
BY
BABUKAR KASHKA (IDN)
Every
year, more people die from unsafe water than from all forms of violence,
including war.
This simple but shocking statement has been launched by UN secretary
general Ban Ki-moon on the occasion of the World Water Day 2010, which
is commemorated on March 22 each year.
In fact, it is estimated that some 3.6 million people, 1.5 millions of
whom are children -- die every year from water-related diseases,
including diarrhoea, typhoid, cholera and dysentery.
So far the most circulated news was that fresh water is becoming
increasingly scare.
And indeed it is -- of all water on earth, 97 percent is salt water, and
of the remaining 3 percent fresh water, some 70 percent is frozen in the
polar icecaps. The other 30 percent is mostly present as soil moisture
or lies in underground aquifers.
Besides, according to estimates less than 1 percent of the world's fresh
water is readily accessible for direct human uses.
Several international organisations such as the Nairobi-based UN
Environment Programme (UNEP), the Rome-based UN Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO), and the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI)
have elaborated in specialised reports the worldwide water situation.
UNFAIR CONSUMPTION
According to them, not only is water scarce, it is also unfairly shared.
In fact, SIWI reports that a child born in the developed world consumes
30 to 50 times as much water as one in the developing world.
“The world’s water crisis is not related to the physical
availability of water, but to unbalanced power relations, poverty and
related inequalities,” says SIWI.
The problem becomes even bigger with rapid population growth, which
caused water withdrawals to have tripled over the last 50 years.
The International Institute reports that an estimated 90 percent of the
3 billion people who are expected to be added to the population by 2050
will be in developing countries, many in regions already in water stress
where the current population does not have sustainable access to safe
drinking water and adequate sanitation,
And it goes further: water scarcity can roughly be divided into two
categories: “apparent” scarcity exists when there is plenty of
water, but is inefficiently and wastefully used; “real” scarcity is
caused by insufficient rainfall or large populations depending on a
limited resource.
Here some more facts:
– About 1.4 billion people, mostly impoverished, live in river basins
where all the blue water is already committed or overcommitted.”
– Around 20 percent of total water used globally is from groundwater
sources (renewable or not), and this share is rising rapidly,
particularly in dry areas, it says.
– Water withdrawals are predicted to increase by 50 percent by 2025 in
developing countries, and 18 per cent in developed countries.
– In 2030, 47 percent of world population will be living in areas of
high water stress. By 2075, the number of people in regions with chronic
water shortage is estimated to be between 3 and 7 billion.
– By 2030 the number of urban dwellers is expected to be about 1.8
billion more than in 2005 and to constitute about 60 percent of the
world’s population.
According to the data gathered by SIWI, with the urban population
rising, many major cities have had to draw freshwater from increasingly
distant watersheds, as local surface and groundwater sources no longer
meet the demand for water, or they are depleted or polluted.
“A nation’s water foot print is defined as the total volume of
freshwater, both green and blue, that is used to produce the goods and
services consumed by the people of the nation, i.e. both food and other
goods and services.”
WATER AND HEALTH
Back to the impact of unsafe water, a study by the Joint Monitoring
Programme (JMP) of the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the UN
children's agency UNICEF provided current trends on water and sanitation
in 209 countries and territories worldwide.
Clean, safe, and adequate freshwater is vital to the survival of all
living organisms and the smooth functioning of ecosystems, communities,
and economies, says the joint study.
However, the quality of the world’s water is “increasingly
threatened as human populations grow, industrial and agricultural
activities expand, and climate change threatens to cause major
alterations of the hydrologic cycle.”
For its part, SIWI informs: “To ensure our basic needs, we all need 20
to 50 litres of water free from harmful contaminants each and every
day."
Almost one-tenth of the global disease burden could be prevented by
improving water supply, sanitation, hygiene and management of water
resources. Such improvements reduce child mortality and improve health
and nutritional status in a sustainable way.
“At any given time, half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by
patients suffering from a water-related disease.”
And here comes more data from SIWI:
– Up to 50 percent of malnutrition is related to repeated diarrhoea or
intestinal nematode infections as a result of unclean water, inadequate
sanitation or poor hygiene.
– 884 million people – about half of whom live in Asia – still
rely on drinking water from unimproved sources such as ponds, streams,
irrigation canals and unprotected dug wells.
– 87 per cent of the world’s population -- 5.7 billion people --
uses drinking water from improved sources.
– 54 per cent uses a piped connection in their dwelling, plot or yard,
and 33 per cent uses other improved drinking water sources such as
public taps, standpipes, tube wells or boreholes, protected dug wells,
protected springs and rainwater collection.
– Women are more than twice as likely as men to go and fetch drinking
water.
– In many places of the world, a staggering 30 to 40 percent of water
or more goes unaccounted for due to water leakages in pipes and canals
and illegal tapping.
– 2.5 billion people are without improved sanitation.
– One billion people in rural areas still practice open defecation.
– More than 5 billion people – 67 percent of the world population
– may still be without access to adequate sanitation in 2030.
– Sanitation coverage in developing countries (49 percent) is only
half that of the developed world (98 percent).
– 1,8 million people die every year from diarrhoea diseases (including
cholera); 90 percent are children under 5, mostly in developing
countries.
– Improved water supply reduces diarrhoea morbidity by 21percent.
– Improved sanitation reduces diarrhoea morbidity by 37.5 percent.
– Hygiene interventions including hygiene education and promotion of
hand washing can lead to a reduction of diarrhea cases by up to 45
percent.
THE POOR, AS USUAL
Almost two in three people lacking access to safe drinking water survive
on less than 2 dollars a day and one in three on less than 1 dollar a
day.
More than 660 million people without adequate sanitation live on less
than 2 dollars a day, and more than 385 million on less than 1 dollar a
day. Every 1 dollar invested in improved water supply and sanitation
yields gains of 4-12 dollars, concludes the SIWI data.
Nothing to comment.
[Source:
IDN-InDepthNews
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