India leads in child diarroheal deaths-UNICEF India

Every second child in rural India is drinking contaminated water. UNICEF experts believe that 50 per cent of water sources in India have become contaminated.  In Uttar Pradesh, contamination levels are as high as 90 per cent whereas in Gujarat, it is around 30 per cent.  In Krishnagiri district in Tamil Nadu water contamination levels had crossed 90 per cent in one block.

Dara Johnston, a water, santiation and hygience expert with Unicef India for the last four years, pointed out: “Two kinds of contamination prevalent in water are faecal and chemical. In Allahabad district, water contamination levels from faecal contamination have crossed 90 per cent.  We conduct random sampling for bacteria in water sources. Bacteria in water comes from human behaviour (largely faecal contamination ) and our solution is to identify behaviour causing it. We do a sanitary surveillance to identify if there is a toilet within ten metres of the water source, do the villagers practise open defaectaion, is garbage being dumped close to the water source".

About the image: Open defaecation in the financial capital of India, Mumbai.  Image source and credit to: An Englishman in Mumbai