SIR: Each year, World Water Day is celebrated March 22 globally. The day is aimed at bringing the attention of nations to the global water crisis and negative repercussions of contaminated water on the human species. The theme of this year is “Groundwater: Making invisible visible”.
It is quite evident that the African continent became an epicenter of so many illnesses due to lack of potable, safe and clean water resulting in waterborne diseases. Contaminated water is the major underlying cause of hepatitis A and E, cholera, diarrhea, polio, typhoid, malaria and others.
According to a recent report of the WHO, contaminated water and poor sanitation are linked to transmission of diseases such as cholera, diarrhea, malaria fever, dysentery, hepatitis, typhoid fever and polio. Other illnesses caused by water pollution include Giardiasis, Hookworm, Gastroenteritis, Encephalitis, stomach cramps and aches, vomiting, copper, arsenicosis, shigella, Norovirus, to name but a few.
Over the years, those aforementioned illnesses have affected many on the African continent, particularly, Sub-Saharan Africa. Unfortunately, the authorities appear not to be keeping their minds on addressing the genesis of the disease so as to mitigate their presence across the continent.
According to 2019 report of WHO, more than 842,000 are estimated to die each year from diarrhea as a result of unsafe drinking-water, sanitation and hand hygiene that are mostly in Africa while typhoid fever kills approximately 200,000 people annually in Sub-Saharan Africa. It is also reported that 1155 die every hour in Africa from disease linked to poor sanitation, poor hygiene and contaminated water.
The frightening rate of population growth on the African continent has been driving demand for clean and sufficient drinking-water. But unfortunately, the Nigerian Senate Committee on Water Resources recently said that it discovered more than 400 abandoned water projects across the country.
Only in Sub-Saharan Africa will you see children, women and girls trek a long distance to fetch drinking-water while most of them rely on surface water such as rivers, lakes, wetland, open wells, canals, streams and ponds that are not regarded as safe sources of drinking-water.
The UN’s Sustainable Development Goal Six focusing on ensuring a clean and stable water supply and effective water sanitation for all people by the year 2030 cannot produce the desired result unless African leaders acknowledge that unavailability of clean and safe drinking water is the root cause of many of the life-threatening illnesses prevalent on the continent.
I conclude by calling on all tiers of government to spare no effort to ensure completion of abandoned water projects across the country. It is true that life without potable, clean, sufficient and safe water is lifeless.
- Mustapha Baba,
Azare, Bauchi State,