WASHINGTON March 5
—
For a few cents each month, families in poor
countries are purifying drinking water by using diluted
bleach and germ-resistant jugs as part of a program that
is cutting in half the deadly cases of waterborne
diarrheal diseases, U.S. health officials said
Wednesday.
It is a low-tech approach that proponents say can pay
for itself and even boost villages' economies. The pilot
program has proved effective enough that the United
States and a group of charities will seek to expand it
to 20 developing countries. That announcement is planned
for an international water meeting in Japan this month.
The key is empowering some of the 1.1 billion people
who drink water tainted by sewage, natural bacteria and
parasites to protect themselves against some of those
threats.
"You can provide people with a means to treat their
own drinking water," said Dr. Eric Mintz of the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention. "It works in the
real world."
Dirty water's chief bane is diarrhea, from cholera,
E. coli bacteria and other bugs. Diarrheal diseases are
a particular threat to young children, killing 2.2
million of them each year, says Population Services
International, a nonprofit group working with CDC and
UNICEF to expand the safe-water system.
Although boiling water kills bacteria, it does not
kill many parasites, and firewood can be scarce and
expensive. Nor does that stop family members from
reinfecting the household water bucket with dirty hands
or cups, a problem the CDC discovered during a major
cholera epidemic in Latin America.
It will take decades for governments to build
reliable water-treatment systems and pipe clean water in
developing nations. The CDC, working with the World
Health Organization, set out to find a simple,
affordable way for families to purify their own water in
the meantime.
Small amounts of chlorine far more diluted than
laundry bleach are a staple of modern water treatment.
The CDC first experimented with generators that let
remote villages brew their own chlorine from salt. Then
scientists began working with bleach makers in different
countries to produce bottles of the special, diluted
version.
The CDC also helped jug makers design germ-resistant
versions, similar to what U.S. campers frequently use.
They are big enough to hold a day's supply, with fill
holes small enough to block hands and a spigot at the
bottom.
People just needs to add one capful of disinfectant
to each water-filled jug and wait 20 minutes.
A bottle of disinfectant, enough to last an average
family a month, sells for 15 cents to 30 cents, Mintz
said. That is enough to cover production costs and bring
a few pennies profit to the producers and village kiosks
that sell the products, he said.
Pilot testing in such countries as Zambia, Kenya and
India show the chlorine-and-safe-storage system can cut
the rate of diarrheal disease in half, Mintz said.
The system is in use in 15 developing countries.
On the Net:
CDC: www.cdc.gov
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. All rights
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