You know what's important? Water. Which is why you should read TAP's special report on freshwater politics. It is, as you may have heard when you turned on the radio this morning, NPR approved. Probably cause it's so depressing:The world is facing a water crisis due to pollution, climate change, and surging population growth of unprecedented magnitude. Unless we change our ways, by the year 2025 two-thirds of the world's population will face water scarcity. The global population tripled in the 20th century, but water consumption went up sevenfold. By 2050, after we add another 3 billion to the population, humans will need an 80 percent increase in water supplies just to feed ourselves. No one knows where this water is going to come from.Scientists call them "hot stains" -- the parts of the Earth now running out of potable water. They include northern China, large areas of Asia and Africa, the Middle East, Australia, the Midwestern United States, and sections of South America and Mexico.The worst effects on people are, of course, in those areas of the world with large populations and insufficient resources to provide sanitation. Two-fifths of the world's people lack access to proper sanitation, which has led to massive outbreaks of waterborne diseases. Half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by people with an easily preventable waterborne disease, and the World Health Organization reports that environmental factors, including contaminated water, are implicated in 80 percent of all sickness and disease worldwide. In the last decade, the number of children killed by diarrhea exceeded the number of people killed in all armed conflicts since World War II. Every eight seconds, a child dies from drinking dirty water.Meanwhile, some wealthier countries are just beginning to understand the depth of their own crises. Many parts of the United States are experiencing severe water shortages. Pressure is mounting on the governors in the Great Lakes region to open up access to the lakes to the burgeoning mega-cities around the basin. In 2007, Lake Superior, the world's largest freshwater lake, dropped to its lowest level in 80 years. Florida is in trouble, trying to keep its fast-spreading lawns and golf courses green. California has a 20-year supply of freshwater left. New Mexico has only 10. And Arizona is out: It now imports all of its drinking water. Experts assert that this is more than a cyclical "drought": Major parts of the United States are running out of water. In fact, the Environmental Protection Agency warns that if current water use continues unchecked, 36 states will suffer water shortages within the next five years.The freshwater supply doesn't get that much attention because, frankly, most of us can only worry about so many things at once. But the situations is actually pretty bad, and if we don't attend to it before the crisis grows acute, we're going to be in much worse shape a few decades down the road.Image used under a Creative Commons license from Snap.
