Sunday, April 15, 2012
To Seriously Improve Global Health, Reinvent the Toilet
This article talks about how better sanitation system could help two-thirds of the world's 7 billion peoples health. According to the World Health Organization, an estimated 2.6 billion people don't even have an access to a minimally sanitary facility. This causes illness and early death. To prevent, we need to come up with new designs for toilets that are hygienic, pleasant, and cheap to make and use, and work without connected to a grid. Few universities are working on reinventing toilets. "Bad sanitation is a problem not so hard to solve, if only we devote ourselves to spreading the wonders of the toilet."http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-08/to-seriously-improve-global-health-reinvent-the-toilet.html
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5 comments:
I think more things like this should be done to increase the standard of living around the world. If we devote resources to solving one problem at a time, little by little, I think we could see a change in third world countries. In my public finance class, we talked about how it would cost 120 billion to get every American out of poverty. Yes, this is a large number, but it is relatively small compared to what our deficit is.
While I agree that removing poverty should be an objective of governments worldwide, one must remember the hidden costs associated with this. In lifting the world out of poverty, we would be raising the standard of living to the point that it would significantly increase demand for resources and infrastructure. This cost could be massive enough to destabilize the fragile balance we have managed to achieve ecologically.
Poverty reduction is something that needs to occur. At the same time, however, we need to work on making the life of the standard out-of-poverty individual far more sustainable, or else we risk far consequences.
Chris - I understand the logic behind your argument. We have limited resources and not everyone can be a "winner." However, this shouldn't be an argument against poverty reduction. While raising the living standards worldwide might be impossible with our limited resources, governments or NGO's can still improve the lives of others with little improvements such as the reinvention of the toilet.
This article shows how advancements in technology really can shift the supply curve to the right. Its almost baffling how such a simple technology in the developed world can be so crucial in another.
I agree that poverty is something that certainly needs to be addressed, and this seems like a more affordable way to help improve the lives of some of those in poverty. Having seen firsthand the lack of a sanitation system in a less developed country, and also the diseases that can result, I think this should be a priority. It would cause a noticeable difference in standard of living.
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