Water for health: taking charge

Long before the advent of modern medical care, industrialized countries decreased their levels of water-related disease through good water management. Yet, even in these countries, outbreaks of water-borne disease continue to occur, sometimes with lethal consequences. In developing countries, preventable water-related disease blights the lives of the poor. Diseases resulting from bad hygiene rank among the leading causes of ill-health. This report on water and sanitation has been issued by the World Health Organization to coincide with the World Water Day 2001. The report says that more than a billion people drink unsafe water each day and that 2.4 billion, or 40 percent of the worlds population, are without adequate sanitation.