Water Crisis

After the snowstorm in January and record rain for months, the sun finally shines bright in Portland in the last couple of days. While the weather is looking absolutely gorgeous, I begins to notice the increasingly amount of water that I have been drinking over the last few days. Up to 60% of the human adult body is water. That percentage is even higher for newborns. Approximately, 78% of their bodies are water.

PC: USGS Water Science School 

Water is vital to life and is an essential nutrient. 

Water can be found in our heart and brain (73%), lungs (83%), skins (64%), muscles and kidneys (79%) and even in our bones (31%). 

To stay healthy, you and I must maintain water balance, which means the amount of water intake need to be equivalent or close to water losses. Failing to do so may result in headache, muscle cramps or delirium and lose consciousness in a severe situation. 

The diagram on the left is taken from USGS Water Science School website to briefly go over multiple functions of water in the human body. 

Not many people have the luxury to drink clean water. There has been a water and sanitation crisis in the Phillipines for years now. Statistically, eighteen Fillipinos die daily from diarrhea and other water-related diseases. Most of the time, the burden of getting water for the family fall under the shoulder of children and women of that family. Below is the picture of Aileen, 8 years old, getting water for her family from a well. 

©2015 Children International

Unfortunately, Phillipines is not the only country to face with water crisis. To learn more about this global issue and the works around this, be sure to check out Phillipines at Green Empowerment Website