By IANS,
Islamabad: An estimated 97,900 people in Pakistan die every year due to lack of clean water and poor sanitation, a report released by an international organisation has revealed.
WaterAid, an international charity organisation, has said in its report that 54,000 children under the age of five die of diarrhoea caused by poor water and sanitation every year in the country, Xinhua reported.
Unless urgent action was taken, Pakistan would not be able to supply 93 percent of its population with safe water and 64 percent of the population with adequate sanitation by year 2015, the report warned.
“Every year thousands of children in Pakistan die due to lack of adequate sanitation and clean water. The government must increase the level of spending on water and sanitation and donor governments increase the share of aid they spend on water and sanitation so that we can work together to turn this situation around,” Siddiq Khan, WaterAid’s Country Representative in Pakistan, said in a press conference Friday.
He called on South Asian countries to spend at least one percent of gross domestic product (GDP) on sanitation services. He also urged donor countries to double global aid flows to water, sanitation and hygiene by prioritising an additional $10 billion every year.