H2O

Water

Can't live with it.

Can't live without it.

Can you imagine having to walk one hour to the nearest pond to retrieve water for your family? Now imagine you know the very water you're about to give your husband, children and parents has mud, worms, or human and animal waste. That's the situation for about 1.1 billion people in the world today. Its estimated 5 million people die every year because of water-related illnesses.

I've partnered with World Vision for years now. I just received their summer news magazine. It's loaded with facts about how water or lack of effects our neighbors. Here are some amazing statistics.

Can't live with it.

The millionaires club no-one wants to join.

• 1 Million: Number of children killed by malaria each year
• 1.6 Million: Child deaths due to diarrhea each year
• 6 Million: People blind today due to trachoma
• 12 Million: People affected by typhoid fever each year
• 400 Million: School-age children infected with parasitic worms.
• 443 Million: School days missed a year because of diseases such as diarrhea and parasitic infections. Equivalent to an entire school year for all 7 year old in Ethiopia

Source: World Vision Summer 2007 & UNESCO

Water-Borne Diseases

Cause: Drinking water contaminated by human, animal, or chemical waste.

Examples: Diarrhea, cholera, typhoid, polio, hepatitis A

Water-Related Diseases

Cause: Being bitten by insects (mosquitoes or flies) that feed or breed in water

Examples: Malaria, dengue fever, river blindness

Water-Based Diseases

Cause: Ingesting organisms that spend part of their life cycle in water

Examples: Guinea worm, bilharzia

Water-Scarce Diseases

Cause: Having poor hygiene or washing with contaminated water

Examples: scabies, trachoma, lice

Guinea worm- When people drink water from a stagnant pond they may be ingesting microscopic larvae. This parasite lives inside the body for about one year, turning into a spaghetti-like worm. Then it escapes from the inside by puncturing the skin. Okay if this doesn't sound bad enough, it can take up to three months for the worm to emerge from the body.

Can't live without it.

Countries where less than half of the population have sustainable access to clean water:

Niger=46%

Democratic Republic of Congo=46%

Mozambique=43%

Chad=42%

Cambodia=41%

Papua New Guinea=39%

Ethiopia=22%

Source: Human Development Report 2006

Remember when your mother would try to cajole you into eating all of your dinner by saying, "You should eat those peas. There are children in Africa starving." Was it just me but didn't you think, "how was my eating green squishy peas going to help them?"

I've recently been told I'm very competitive. Yes I like to win. That's why this problem with water touches me. Its a battle we can win.

Did you know?

When a community gains access to clean water, its child mortality rate drops by half. (United Nations Millennium Campaign)

"And if anyone gives even a cup of cold

water to one of these little ones because

he is my disciple, I tell you the truth,

he will certainly not lose his reward."

-Matthew 10:42

The cost to bring clean, safe water to a community is roughly $2 per person per year-that's less than a penny a day.

Quote from Richard Stearns: World Vision Summer 2006

The world spends $100 billion a year on bottled water-a surprising statistic because most people who buy it usually have high-quality water piped to their homes. Meanwhile, an investment of a mere $30 billion a year would halve the number of people who have no access to clean water by 2015.

Source: Earth Policy Institute

No me eating peas will not stop the children in Africa from starving. Me drinking the clean water piped into my house and donating the money I would've used to buy bottled water will help to provide clean water to my neighbors.

There was another time God's people were thirsty and God answered prayer.

"The Lord answered Moses, 'Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.' So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel."

Exodus 16:5-6