These provinces are: Sulu, Maguindanao, Tawi-Tawi, Basilan, Masbate, Zamboanga del Norte and Sur, Negros Oriental and Occidental, Sultan Kudarat, Palawan, Camarines Norte, Leyte, Misamis Occidental, Apayao, Quezon, North Cotabato, Bukidnon, Iloilo, Guimaras, Agusan del Sur, Nueva Vizcaya, Ilocos Norte, and
Benguet.
Today's "crisis in water and sanitation is -- above all -- a crisis of the poor," says the new United Nations Development Program study: "Beyond Scarcity: Power, Poverty and the Water Crisis."
"People living in the slums of Jakarta, Manila, Mumbai and Nairobi face shortages of clean water," the UNDP study claims.
"(But) their neighbors in high income suburbs...keep their lawns green and swimming pools topped up. (The poor) pay five to ten times more for water per unit than those in high-income areas of their own cities."
Patchy research indicates that the poorest "spend more than 10% of their household income on water."
Dr. Klaus Toepfer, during his term as executive director of the Nairobi-based United Nations Environment Program, said: "Unlike the energy crisis, the water crisis is life threatening. The level of suffering and misery represented by these statistics is almost beyond comprehension. And it is the children and women who suffer most."
"As many as 76 million people - mainly children - will die from preventable, water-related diseases by 2020 even if current United Nations goals are reached," said Dr. Peter H. Gleick, director of the Pacific Institute for Studies in Development, Environment and Security.
The UN has set a goal of 2015 for cutting in half the number of people who can't reach or afford safe drinking water. "It is a grave moral shortcoming that 1.2 billion people cannot drink water without courting disease or death," asserts "The Last Oasis."
Providing clean water can save most of the 1.8 million children who die yearly from diarrhea, the study says.
Installing a flush toilet in the home increases a child's chance by 59 percent of celebrating his or her birthday.
In the Philippines, out of every 1,000 kids, 27 never make it to their first birthday.
In industrialized countries like Sweden or Japan, water-borne disease is a subject for history books. But in the Philippines and other countries in Asia, it involves hospital wards and morgues.
"All of these diseases are associated with our failure to provide clean water," deplored Dr. Peter Gleick, director of the Pacific Institute for Studies in Development, Environment and Security.
"I think it's terribly bleak, especially because we know what needs to be done to prevent these deaths. We're doing some of it, but the efforts that are being made are not aggressive enough."
As a rule of thumb, hydrologists designate water-stressed countries as those with annual supplies of 1,000 to 2,000 cubic meters per person. When the figure drops below 1,000 cubic meters (about 725 gallons per person a day), nations are considered water-scarce - that is, lack of water becomes a severe constraint on food production, economic development, and protection of natural systems.
Projections show that by 2025, 50 countries -- home to more than 3.3 billion people -- will face water stress or scarcity. By 2050, the number of countries afflicted with water stress or scarcity will rise to 54, and their populations to 4 billion people -- 40 percent of the projected global population of 9.4 billion.
