Political Quotes

“on the floor of the House we regularly deal with problems and tragedies. Recently, we have been contending with the horrible consequences of the hurricanes in Florida. But the greatest tragedy in the world today is seldom mentioned here on this floor. Between 2 and 5 million people each year die needlessly because of a lack of access to clean water and adequate sanitation, up to 10,000 people a day and even more tragically over 4,000 children each and every day. Eighty percent of all illness in the developing world is water related, and at any given time, half the population is sick from water-related disease. Inadequate sanitation makes worse the problems of poverty, disease, bio-diversity loss, climate change impact and general environmental degradation. In the developing world, 90 to 95 percent of household wastes are released untreated into streams, open drains, lake, rivers and coastal waters and lead to wider environmental problems. Many young women in the developing world are not able to go to school because of how much time they spend just getting the water supply for their family. The magnitude is difficult to comprehend. More than 1.1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water. One in six of the world's population and more than 2.3 billion, one in three, lack access to adequate sanitation.”