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There are many cheap and effective ways to provide safe water to the world's poor regions. But projects often fail due to inadequate planning, maintenance or persuasive power
For more than 2 billion people, safe drinking water isn't a given. Not for them a clean, reliable supply of treated water splurting out on demand from a kitchen tap - instead, they face often long treks to wells, rivers, pools of rainwater or faucets that yield water laced with disease-transmitting feces and other contaminants.
More than 500,000 deaths a year from diarrhea are linked to this very basic lack, and public health officials, philanthropic groups and researchers have worked to move the needle on the problem for decades.
So enthusiasm soared in the early 2000s for a new and compellingly simple approach. Instead of waiting for governments to act, or for projects that progressed at a snail's pace, what if villages and households were empowered to clean water themselves? A slew of cheap and easy technologies were available for the job.
Comment: The AIDs experimentation in Africa theory has surfaced many times without conclusion. Conspiracy or truth? Anything is possible. Everything can be denied.
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