Fight childhood disease with safe drinking water

Here's a brief story about someone your donations help support.  As we've mentioned before we have trained many college students from throughout Latin America in our methods of water testing and water purification.  When these highly motivated students return home they apply what they have learned in their communities, tackling local problems for themselves.  We are proud of them and support them however we can.

Vicki was a student of ours who came from a very traditional area in southern Mexico and wanted to help her community. She is very interested in Biology and ecology and has organized clean up and recycling campaigns to protect the local environment.  Recently she took on another big project, cleaning up waste water that was polluting the local streams.

Waste wash water from her schools latrine and other sources was running onto the ground making a muddy mess and contaminating fields and water supplies.  Vicki studied the problem and decided to build an organic bioswale filter to cleanse the water before returning it to the stream.  Her plan was a system of connected settling ponds with aquatic plants and gravel to remove contaminates.  Agua Pura helped her with the design and provided funds for her project.

Using local help and enlisting the aid of the students she built a very effective system that has cleaned up the mess and now filters the waste water before channeling it into local fields and streams for irrigation.  Vicki and her local community are rightly proud of the work they have done.

Agua Pura Para El Pueblo often receives reports like these from students and supporters and people we have trained all over Latin America.  It is very satisfying to see that our work is being carried on and that families lives are improving because of it. We work one student at a time, one family at a time, one community at a time and  your support and donations are what has made these projects successful.  Thank you so much.

For your interest, Vicki posted her own summary of her project, in Spanish, on our website which you can see on the attached link.

In the tiny community of Llano Largo, Honduras,  Leyda L. runs a small community pharmacy where she sells over the counter meds but can also take blood pressures, measure blood glucose, and provide first aid. In 2013 Agua Pura trained Leyda in water testing and water purification  and she still uses the WAPI we gave her own to ensure her family’s water is safe and promotes their use to her neighbors.
In 2013, Agua Pura first visited Honduras and conducted clean water workshops – helping communities test their water for contamination, and learn how to use Water Pasteurization Indicators (WAPI’s) to ensure their water is safe to drink, and Leyda was at those workshops.  Last month, we returned for the third time to help our partner, Project Global Village, set up manufacturing of WAPIs in the mountainous Ocotepeque region of Honduras – so that they can bring WAPI technology to the 1500 families with small children in the area.
Many communities all over Honduras lack clean drinking water – the World Health Organization and UNICEF estimated 1 million Hondurans still do not have access to safe water sources. Contaminated drinking water is a major source of illness in developing countries, and one of the leading causes of death for young children.  We feel that these families cannot wait for governments or outside benefactors to provide safe water, they need help now!  Our current goal is to start by providing the 1500 families in communities like Leyda’s with WAPI’s, and with the help of Project Global Village go from there to bring safe water to all families in the country.
This is the first time WAPIs have been manufactured in Latin America, and we are very excited about it!  Setting up local production of WAPIs, and working with community leaders like Leyda to educate the population and promote their use will ensure that families in the Ocotepeque region do not have to depend on outside help to protect themselves from water borne diseases. 

Thanks so much, Tom Carter

With your continued support of our work, we will continue  this important project in Honduras – providing training, materials and monitoring the impact of WAPI distribution.  Thank you so much for your help!              Can you consider becoming a recurring monthly donor?  It would really help us with our long term programs to have regular predictable income. You can sign up here.

 Do you want a WAPI for yourself to see how they work?  Write to me and I’ll send you one at no charge.  These are simple, safe, inexpensive devices and they save lives!