 | | A parent bathes their child in the sink with newly installed running water from DigDeep’s Home Water System on the Navajo Nation. Photo © DigDeep |
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| For Indigenous people living across the United States, the Covid-19 pandemic is the newest chapter in a long history of fighting against disease. The struggle this time is much harder because of a basic deficiency: not all tribe members have clean water at home.
“Covid is now a secondary problem,” said Emma Robbins, the director of the Navajo Water Project and a member of the Navajo Nation. “The primary problem is now drinking water.” |
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 | | Courtesy of Emily Woods |
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| Since first touching the East African country in early March, the novel coronavirus has spread steadily and personal mobility has been restricted. Confirmed cases now exceed more than 16,600, and 278 people have died.
Now as Covid-19 cases continue to rise in Kenya, a coordinated effort by the government and aid organizations addresses water, hygiene, and sanitation. |
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The volume of Covid-19 news can be overwhelming. We've started a live blog, updated throughout the day, to help you sort through it. It's a library for how water, sanitation, and hygiene connect to the pandemic, both in the US and globally.
Featured Covid-19 + water coverage from this week include: |
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The rainy season has hit Burkina Faso, and with it an array of flooding and waterborne disease that has uprooted people from their homes.
As of this summer, the number of internally displaced people in the landlocked West African country has grown close to a million. |
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What's Up With Water - July 27, 2020
For the news you need to start the week, tune into “What’s Up With Water” fresh on Monday’s on iTunes, Spotify, iHeart Radio, and SoundCloud.
This week's episode features coverage on Russia, which has fined the world’s largest producer of palladium and nickel about $2 billion for a fuel spill in May.
Additional international reporting looks at Asia, where severe rains worsened flooding problems that have caused massive damage in numerous countries this summer.
And in Egypt, suspected Covid-19 outbreaks in the country’s prisons and police stations were announced in a statement last week by the group Human Rights Watch.
Finally, in this week's featured story Circle of Blue reports on the coronavirus response in Brazil, where community leaders have stepped in to compensate for government failures. You can listen to the latest edition of What's Up With Water, as well as all past editions, by downloading the podcasts on iTunes, following Circle of Blue on Spotify, following on iHeart Radio, and subscribing on SoundCloud. |
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| From Circle of Blue's Archives: |
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 | | A water tank on the Navajo Nation. Photo courtesy of Flickr/Creative Commons user CEBImagery |
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| Speaking via Facebook Live on May 19, Jonathan Nez, president of the Navajo Nation, reiterated the depth of the tribe’s clean-water challenge, noting that 30 to 40 percent of people living on the reservation do not have running water. Then he made a promise.
“We’re going to be addressing that through the $600 million dollars,” Nez said, referring to the lack of running water in so many homes.
Nez suggested that half of the CARES Act money — some $300 million — be spent on water projects. Certainly, such an expenditure would be an enormous benefit to the tribe. But legal experts are less confident that the funds can be put toward the Navajo Nation’s chronic water infrastructure deficit. |
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