Overview
The Problem
Clean, safe drinking water is a basic human right yet more than one billion people worldwide live without it. Dirty water affects more people than AIDS and cancer combined.
Every day, more than 5,000 children across the developing world die from diseases related to unclean water; that’s nearly one child every 15 seconds, a casualty rate that is simply staggering. In all, unclean water kills more than four million people worldwide each year — making waterborne-illnesses the leading cause of disease and death worldwide.
The amount of disease related to dirty water is also shocking. It is estimated that no less than 50 percent of all disease is water-related. Water contamination is closely linked to a variety of bacterial, parasitic and other waterborne diseases, including cholera and diarrhea.
In many countries, there is simply no technology or infrastructure available for sustainable water sanitization. Many have no choice but to get their water from the same sources in which animals drink and defecate.
Increasingly, the world is coming to recognize that this crisis must stop. In 2000, the United Nations’ member states adopted the Millennium Development Goals, which seek to cut in half the number of people without access to clean, safe drinking water and basic sanitation by the year 2015.
The Solution
In support of this mission, we have developed the world’s first lightweight BioSand water filter, called Hydraid®, which can meet all of a family’s daily water needs for 10 years or more.
The Hydraid® BioSand Water filter is built on one of the most effective, proven purification technologies in the world — BioSand filtration. The plastic version we have developed now makes this technology dramatically more portable and low-cost compared to traditional concrete filters — a critical factor in accessing rural and remote areas of the world.
Through our safe water initiative, you too can truly play an integral role in addressing one of this world’s leading health crises.