The Clean Water Here social-media initiative to promote safe drinking water was launched today in celebration of UN Water World Water Day. The overall social-media voice of the campaign exceeded 790 million people.
Thanks to the support of Pitbull, Pink, Bruno Mars, Britney Spears, Maroon 5, Ed Sheeran, Pharrell Williams, Kesha, Sting, Fergie, Ryan Seacrest, Jason Derulo, Christina Aguilera, Ziggy Marley, Shania Twain, Seal, Andra Day, Seal, Pentatonix, Natasha Bedingfield, Nick Jonas, Juanes, Niall Horan, Fifth Harmony, Sean Mendes and more, this campaign encouraged and empowered the public to lend their social voices to help people understand the nature and scope of the global water crisis by promoting safe drinking water here in the United States on UN World Water Day.
UN World Water Day is coordinated by UN-Water and the 2017 campaign is led by UN Environment, UN-HABITAT, United Nations University and the World Health Organization.
“I want to thank the celebrities and the public who used their influence through social media to support Clean Water Here,” said Lani Dolifka, the Founder of Clean Water Here and CEO of Watermill Express, “There are too many communities in the United States and around the world that still don’t have access to safe drinking water. It’s particularly important for the lives of our children.”
“Making the right to water a practical reality holds out the promise of transformed lives for billions of people.” said Dr. Jamie Bartram, Director of the Water Institute at the University of North Carolina, whose world-renowned work as a professor and author/editor includes dozens of academic papers and books discussing the intersection of where water and health come together. “We also must make safe water available to those robbed of their own potential by neurotoxic pollutants, like lead in Flint and elsewhere in the United States.”
Evidence shows that children exposed to lead develop neurological deficiencies, leading to issues such as childhood intellectual disabilities, hearing problems, anemia, or behavior problems. There are an estimated 600,000 new cases of child lead exposure every year worldwide. Additionally in the United States, aging infrastructure, limited funding and management capacity for disadvantaged communities, the degradation of source water, and the risks from unregulated contaminants all contribute to the growing concern domestically.
“We believe that access to safe drinking water is a basic human right,” said David Clark, the co-creator of Clean Water Here and the Founder of Cause Flash. “We commend UN-Water for its leadership on this important issue, and their ongoing work as the effective mechanism that coordinates the UN’s work on water and sanitation. Collectively, between all the parties involved, I am both pleased and proud of our ground-breaking campaign.”