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    Conditions are rapidly improving for the world's poorest people. Between 2015 and 2024, billions of people gained access to safe water and sanitation, though 1 in 4 still lack safe drinking water.
    Futurology

    Conditions are rapidly improving for the world’s poorest people. Between 2015 and 2024, billions of people gained access to safe water and sanitation, though 1 in 4 still lack safe drinking water.


    "Between 2015 and 2024, humanity recorded one of the fastest expansions of basic welfare of all time: 961 million people gained safe drinking water, 1.2 billion gained safe sanitation, and 1.5 billion gained access to basic hygiene services, while the number of unserved fell by nearly 900 million. Coverage has risen to 74%, 58% and 80% respectively, while open defecation has dropped by 429 million people."

    One of the most depressing of human biases is to hyperfocus on bad news, to the exclusion of positive things. 'If it bleeds, it leads, ' as the TV news shows say. Even in the social media age, where TV news is fading in importance, the same instincts predominate.

    The results? People think the state of the world is much worse than it is. Not just that, they think they are powerless to change things for the better.

    Meanwhile, groups of people like UNICEF and WHO, often dismissed as irrelevant do-gooders, go about making the world a better place. If the numbers given access to basic water and sanitation can jump this much in 9 years, then giving it to nearly 100% of people is in our future, and maybe sooner than we think.

    1 in 4 people globally still lack access to safe drinking water – WHO, UNICEF

    Conditions are rapidly improving for the world's poorest people. Between 2015 and 2024, billions of people gained access to safe water and sanitation, though 1 in 4 still lack safe drinking water.
    byu/lughnasadh inFuturology

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    7 Comments

    2. youthofoldage on

      Thank you for posting this! Here in America, everyone is depressed because we seem to be regressing (life expectancy, health care etc.). But in the poorest parts of the world, amazing progress is being made. Imagine the human potential that is being unlocked!

    3. ji1651 on

      So the ultra poor are getting better, great news. Too bad that’s on the shoulders of the poor and middle class because the rich are hoarding more wealth than ever before.

    4. NinjaLanternShark on

      We need to resist making the mistake of thinking international aid isn’t needed or isn’t important because things in the developing world are improving. If we (the collective, global we) stop investing in making the world work for 100% of humanity, those gains will slip away fast.

    5. random20190826 on

      I am a Chinese Canadian. While China is not “the poorest country in the world” by GDP per capita (at $13300), Chinese people do not have “access to safe drinking water” by some standards because tap water is dangerous.

      When I was in elementary school in China, even in Grade 1, the teachers repeatedly emphasized to the class: “tap water is not safe to drink because it contains bacteria and viruses that can only be killed by boiling”.

      My first cousin and his wife both work for the water utility in our hometown of Guangzhou and they know first hand how dirty the water is. Every time I visit China, I have to accept the fact that, although it is annoying (especially in the summer when it is 35C and the relative humidity is 100%), I can’t just turn on the tap and start drinking for safety reasons. Keep in mind, after living in Canada for 17 years, I have become very comfortable with the idea of drinking 2 liters of tap water every day.

    7. HoldTime1831 on

      Capitalism lifted 80 percent of world population from extreme poverty in only 200 years.