‘Dying of Thirst’: New Report Highlights Global Water Crisis
Urgent Action Needed Now to Combat Deadly Waterborne Diseases and
Critical Water Shortage, Says GFA World
STONEY CREEK, Ontario — An eye-opening report from GFA (formerly Gospel for Asia), a leading faith-based humanitarian agency, has revealed key new insights into a critical survival issue — what experts are calling a “worldwide water crisis” that threatens to get worse.
“The water crisis the world is facing isn’t going to get any better,” said Dr. KP Yohannan, GFA founder. “We need to start thinking seriously about these things now to prepare ourselves and future generations for the challenges we will face in the days to come, so we can be better equipped to handle them.”
The growing water crisis will have the most devastating impact on the nearly 2 billion people who live in desert regions, who currently share only 2 percent of the planet’s usable water, according to the report released today by GFA World (www.gfa.ca).
The report projects the crisis will deepen as the world’s population spikes and demand for drinkable water skyrockets by an estimated 30 percent in the next 30 years — putting massive pressure on the planet’s available clean water sources.
Nearly 2 billion people — one in every four people on the planet — live in arid or semi-arid areas where water is scarce, and 2.1 billion people live without safe drinking water.
Deadly dehydration and waterborne diseases — such as diarrhea, typhoid and hepatitis A — are rampant, ravaging communities and hitting young children especially hard. Chronic diarrhea, which has a high correlation with drinking contaminated water, kills 1.5 million children every year, mostly in Africa and South Asia.
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