Funders’ Support For Water And Sanitation Efforts

“Drinking water quality has a major influence on public health,” says the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). However, it is easy for people in the US to be complacent about access to clean water and unaware of challenges in developing countries. Even in the US, “clean water is not always assured,” the CDC notes. Through its Safe Water for Community Health (Safe WATCH) program, it awards grants to help state and local health departments reduce exposures to harmful contaminants in some wells and other private drinking water systems. The CDC calculated that about one in eight US residents obtain their drinking water from a private well. Flint, Michigan, “one of the poorest cities in America,” is one of the areas highlighted in Protecting the Health of Children: A National Snapshot of Environmental Health Services. This March 2019 American Public Health Association report, funded by theW.K.Kellogg Foundation, recalls Flint being in the national spotlight when its drinking water became contaminated with bacteria and lead. The report states, “Individuals and communities should not have to ask about the efficacy of essential services provided, such as whether regulated drinkingwater is safe for consumption.” According to August 2019 news reports, Newark, New Jersey, was having a water “crisis” from lead contamination. That same month, according to the Weather Channel and the Times of India, water scarcity in Chennai, India, was leading to crime. In November 2019 HuffPost published “Puerto Rico’s Next Big Crisis Is Water,” which says that climate change, federal austerity measures, and lax regulation on the island “are setting the stage for another catastrophe.” County Health Rankings and Roadmaps, a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) program at the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, includes a measure on health-related drinking water violations, by county. The World Health Organization (WHO) released fact sheets on drinking water and on sanitation in June 2019. In 2010, the WHO notes, the United Nations General Assembly “recognized the human right to water and sanitation.” But 785 million people in the world lack even “basic” drinking water service (meaning an improved source of water that can be collected “within a round trip of 30 minutes”). The WHO reminds us that “contaminated water and poor sanitation are linked to transmission of diseases” such as diarrhea, cholera, polio, and typhoid. With improved andmore accessible water sources, “people spend less time and effort physically collecting it,” so “they can be productive in other ways.” Other advantages include lowermedical costs, as well as healthier children with better school attendance. The WHO also reports that two billion people around the world “still do not have basic sanitation facilities such as toilets or latrines.” WASHfunders.org continues as an information hub about water access, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and philanthropy’s role in that sector, Inga Ingulfsen of CANDID (which resulted when the Foundation Center and GuideStar merged) told Health Affairs. Grants for the site concluded, so CANDID funds the website’s upkeep out of its own budget. Thehopewas that thewebsitewould lead to creation of “a more organized group of [WASH] funders,” but that “didn’t end up materializing,” she said. A small sampling of funding in water and sanitation follows.