World leaders must make addressing the global water crisis a global priority, WaterAid urges
Today, the 2024 Global Water Monitor report was released, finding that climate change is having a detrimental impact on water-related extreme weather events making them more extreme and less predictable. This means communities can barely recover from one extreme event before another hits, undermining their long-term resilience.
In response to the 2024 Global Water Monitor report, Helen Rumford, Lead Policy Analyst For Climate at WaterAid UK said:
"The new Global Water Monitor report underscores that climate change is driving a sharp and deadly surge in water disasters, causing 8,700 deaths and costing $550 billion in damages in 2024.
"The global water crisis is stripping away life-saving hygiene and sanitation essentials and challenging people's ability to adapt and thrive – addressing this must become a global priority.
"It is time for world leaders to open their eyes and take bold collective action on water with super-charged finance behind it - before daily life as we know it completely unravels.”
ENDS
Safeeyah Kazi, Senior Media Officer, [email protected]. Or call WaterAid’s press line on 020 7793 4537, or email [email protected].
Notes to editors
About WaterAid
WaterAid is an international not-for-profit determined to make clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene normal for everyone, everywhere within a generation. We work alongside communities in 22 countries to secure these three essentials that transform people’s lives. Since 1981, WaterAid has reached almost 29 million people with clean water, and over 29 million with decent toilets.
For more information, visit our website wateraid.org/uk; follow us on Twitter @WaterAidUK, @WaterAid or @WaterAidPress; or find us on Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram.
- 703 million people in the world – almost one in ten – don’t have clean water close to home.
- 2.2 billion people in the world – more than one in four – don’t have safe water.
- Almost 2 billion people in the world – one in four – lack soap and/or water to wash their hands at home, if they have a place at all.
- 1.5 billion people in the world – almost one in five – don’t have a decent toilet of their own.
- 570 million people in the world – 1 in 14 – have a decent toilet but have to share it with people outside their family. This compromises the privacy, dignity and safety of women and girls.1
- Almost 400,000 children under five die every year due to diseases caused by unsafe water, sanitation and hygiene. That's more than 1000 children a day, or almost one child every one and a half minutes.2
- Investing in safely managed water, sanitation and hygiene services provides up to 21 times more value than it costs.3
1: WHO/UNICEF (2023), Progress on household drinking water, sanitation and hygiene 2000-2022: special focus on gender (accessed 11 Jul 2023)
2: WHO (2023), Burden of disease attributable to unsafe drinking-water, sanitation and hygiene: 2019 update (accessed 24 Jul 2023)
3: WaterAid (2021), Mission-critical: Invest in water, sanitation and hygiene for a healthy and green economic recovery (accessed 1 Nov 2023).
