DR SYLVESTER IKHISEMOJIE FROM PUNCH
Every year, it is known that diseases carried by water afflict many hundreds of millions of people around the world. Many of these people live in areas of the world where there is no safe, clean accessible water that can be delivered or transported to the end user in the safety of their homes or at least within their communities. The parts of the world that are mostly affected by this unique lack of potable water are to be found in developing countries. Most of these nations are found in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Latin America. Of the seven most common waterborne diseases in the world, diarrhoea is their most central symptom. The most recent research shows that diarrhoea is the second most common cause of death in children under the age of five years. This sad reality causes more deaths than HIV/AIDS, malaria and measles combined. This represents a massive number of deaths throughout the developing world such that countries such as Niger, Chad, Burkina Faso, Bangladesh, Yemen, Vietnam, Cambodia and Sri Lanka are particularly badly affected. Other members of this sad group include Venezuela, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sudan, India, Burundi and South Sudan. Guinea, Sierra Leone, Laos and Guinea Bissau also belong to this group of countries. This translates to hundreds of thousands of deaths throughout those regions of the world which also see the largest proportion of out of school children within their total populations.
It is not an accident that this relationship exists at all. For how is it possible that children who are ill all the time and cannot get sufficient water to take a proper bath because they must travel several kilometres to obtain such water? How can they possibly be in school? Added to that is the burden of relieving their bowels when they need to go to the toilet and are constrained to defecate in the open by which they maintain the vicious cycle of perpetrating a preventable disease condition. These diseases are caused by the ingestion of water contaminated by certain microorganisms mainly bacteria and viruses. Most of the time, these diseases are started when the organisms are consumed through contaminated water and food. The other way to get them is by coming in contact directly with faeces. It therefore means that if every person in the world was able to practice safe hygiene and sanitation and have unhindered access to clean water, many of these organisms would not exist. And while a lot of countries such as China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have made great progress in ameliorating this problem over much of the last 20 years, those nations particularly in Africa that were among the most deprived at the start of the century have fallen further behind. The rash of internal strife, wars, the Covid-19 pandemic and several epidemics have not helped their status. Indeed, these disease outbreaks have only served to demonstrate how severe the lack of access is, but the disruptions caused have taken away much needed funds to other sectors of the economies of those countries.
One of the leading disease conditions that come to the fore among the people of the developing world is typhoid fever. It is a well-known disease condition in many developing countries. It is highly contagious and is contracted through the consumption of contaminated water, unsafe food and poor sanitation. Such unsafe food is often prepared in the open with dirty utensils and stagnant water. Some of the common symptoms are fever which gradually increases in severity, fatigue, sweating, muscle aches, abdominal pain, diarrhoea or constipation. In addition, there are often severe headaches and insomnia. Another disease condition found in this group is cholera which is found in situations of humanitarian emergencies or in remote villages where there is rampant poverty and poor sanitation. However, even in the centre of our cities right here at home, this disease condition often erupts with deadly consequences. This happens most commonly during the rainy season when even what passes for pipe-borne water in our towns and cities becomes contaminated with both brackish water in our open drains and broken pipes that allow stagnant water to mix with the treated water inside the pipes. This becomes a recipe for disaster as the unsuspecting consumer, believing the pipe-borne water to be clean enough for consumption takes no further measures to ensure its safety and consumes it straight from the taps. The results are seen in the profuse vomiting which results, diarrhoea, nausea and muscle cramp.
