This is something that has been bothering me for a while. The way most of us here in the United States of A. take the availability of safe drinking water for granted. Yet, lack of potable water is one of the major problems for the rest of earth’s population: 1.3 billion people lack access to it. Millions of people die each year because of this, among them approximately 6,000 children every day. This number will go up. The U.S.A. does not have a water policy. Let me repeat that: Your government does not have a coherent plan to ensure future availability of safe drinking water for all of us. Several sources have recently picked up on this issue and I’ll make some daring predictions:
Prediction 1: The price of water right here in the U.S. will increase tremendously over the next couple of years. And rightly so.
Prediction 2: Increases in human population will lead to more armed conflicts that have water scarcity as one or their main causes.
If you are one of those people that opens the faucet and leaves the water running during your morning shave, while brushing your teeth you will be in for a surprise in the near future. Your water bill will (and should) go up.
Sources:
Scientific American, Facing a Freshwater Crisis, July 2008 - Quiz: 20 Questions: Freshwater
TomDispatch, Those hard rains are gonna fall, July 2008
United Nations: Water: A Matter of Life and Death
YouTube: Water: A Commodity?
