WHO Water Quality and Health Strategy 2013-20;ï‚· Contaminated water serves as a mechanism to transmit communicable diseases s...

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WHO Water Quality and Health Strategy 2013-20;

ï‚· Contaminated water serves as a mechanism to transmit communicable diseases such as diarrhoea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid and guinea worm infection. WHO estimates that in 2008 diarrhoeal disease claimed the lives of 2.5 million people. For children under five, this burden is greater than the combined burden of HIV/AIDS and malaria.

ï‚· A total of 58 countries from all continents reported a cumulative total of 589,854 cholera cases in 2011,representing an increase of 85% from 20104. The greatest proportion of cases was reported from the island of Hispaniola and the African continent.
These trends reflect the need to shift from basic responsiveness to a comprehensive, multidisciplinary approach that works with communities to improve access to safe drinking-water and sanitation, encourages behavioral change and promotes the targeted use of oral cholera vaccines where the disease is endemic.
ï‚· Millions of people are exposed to dangerous levels of biological contaminants and chemical pollutants in their drinking-water due to inadequate management of urban, industrial or agricultural wastewater.
In addition, dangerously high concentrations of chemical hazards, such as arsenic and fluoride, originating from natural sources affect millions and cause conditions such as cancer and fluorosis.

Inorganic arsenic is present at high levels in the groundwater of a number of countries, including Argentina, Chile, China, India (West Bengal), Mexico, the United States of America, and particularly Bangladesh where 20 million and 45 million people are at risk of being exposed to arsenic concentrations that are greater than the national standard of 50 μg/L and the WHO guideline value of 10 μg/L, respectively.
ï‚· In many parts of the world, insects that live or breed in water serve as vectors of disease. Water quality is not a major determinant, although anopheline vectors of malaria breed only in clean water and culicine vectors of lymphatic filariasis prefer organically polluted water.

However, an immediate link exists between household water storage and vector breeding. Dengue fever outbreaks have increased fourfold since 1995, with 2.5 billion people at risk today. WHO estimates that 50-100 million dengue infections occur worldwide each year.