It is unbelievable but true that a habitant of the low-income settlement in Kibera, Nairobi, pays as much as five times the price paid by the average U.S. citizen for a litre of water. The situation is particularly worsening in Africa where, between 1990 and 1994, the percentage of the population with access to municipal supplies has actually declined from 82 per cent to 64 per cent. On Water Pollution and Health Pollution is one of the major contributors to the urban water problem. It affects rivers, lakes and groundwater and much of it comes from poor sanitation and uncontrolled solid waste disposal. Industrial effluent is another major source of pollution.
Pollution leads to a variety of health problems.
Diarrhoea, for example, resulting from the lack of water and poor sanitation, causes 3.3 million deaths a year, mainly of children under the age of five. This is equivalent to a child dying every ten seconds, or, as someone has said, a jumbo jet crashing every hour. Pollution from all sources, large and small industry, informal sector or domestic must be reduced to protect surface and ground water. Then there is the profligate use of water by the affluent sections of the society. With little disincentive for wasteful use, many use treated water for non-essential purposes, such as car washing and gardening.