The fact is, not much. Cities with large sections of the population living excluded and marginalized lives is all too common these days, not the exception. It is estimated that 600 million people in cities all over the world now live in overcrowded and poor quality housing without adequate water, sanitation, electricity, drainage or garbage collection. And that’s just urban dwellers. Over 1 billion rural people live in equally bad conditions. In total, 2.4 Billion people do not have access to adequate sanitation services, and 1.2 billion people do not have access to drinking water[1].
I can’t even spend a day without access to sanitation. Why? Because when I get thirsty I neither want to walk for hours or risk my life with badly stored water; and when I need the toilet, I don’t particularly want my excrement floating down open sewers past my neighbours, spreading diseases along its way to the sea. I also don’t particularly want to find myself swimming in our collective excrement on a nice day out at the beach just because my government is incapable of treatment.
If I live up North in the poorer areas, having to find a spot in the wilderness is not exactly consistent with my image of a technologically advanced global village. I also wouldn’t mind being able to walk out of my house on a rainy day and not find myself grappling with a river of mud. Switching a light bulb without having to either steel the electrons from the electricity companies who find it unprofitable to make that last connection to my poor household or paying a premium to some dodgy neighbour with a meter prepared to sell me electricity at a premium.
That’s why these services have been deemed as our human rights. We can’t do without them and live a semi-descent life. Yet such huge numbers of people all over the world have to survive without access to services I literally take for granted. And these numbers are so huge they are hard to fathom.
If I live up North in the poorer areas, having to find a spot in the wilderness is not exactly consistent with my image of a technologically advanced global village. I also wouldn’t mind being able to walk out of my house on a rainy day and not find myself grappling with a river of mud. Switching a light bulb without having to either steel the electrons from the electricity companies who find it unprofitable to make that last connection to my poor household or paying a premium to some dodgy neighbour with a meter prepared to sell me electricity at a premium.
That’s why these services have been deemed as our human rights. We can’t do without them and live a semi-descent life. Yet such huge numbers of people all over the world have to survive without access to services I literally take for granted. And these numbers are so huge they are hard to fathom.
Here in Brazil, the problem is highlighted by the sheer scale and inequality of the problem. Three million houses and twelve million people live without adequate access to water. Almost twenty three million households and ninety three million people do not have access to drainage[2]. Not statistics, but men, women and children, old people, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers and grand parents. That’s what is meant by exclusion of the masses. In the case of adequate access to sanitation, over 57% of the total population of Brazil is being denied these basic human rights.
[1] Social Watch reports by commitments. 2003. Privatising Human Rights – the impact of globalisation on access to adequate housing, water and sanitation
[2] Politicas de saneamento ambiental: Inovacoes na perspectiva do controle social. Statistic from ‘Cf. Alianca pesquisa e desenvolvimento (1995) – Page 26
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