Blog Action Day

As I contemplated my options for what I could write for Blog Action Day post that relates to climate change, I kept trying to think of the most powerful, and hopefully unique way to express my concern. I first racked my brain for sentimental stories about how climate change has affected my life. Perhaps an anecdote about my first middle school dance, canceled because of the weather. The more logical and studious side of me considered the more scientific approach of discussing the other prehistoric climate events that shaped our modern ecosystems. Then I though of compromising and telling the sad tale of an endangered species, like an orangutan whose mother was killed by poachers or polar bears swimming until they drown. All of these topics seemed boring and/or over done, especially since my education was not in the eloquent arts of English or Journalism, but rather in the science, and we all know that scientists are not known for their incredible communication (or social) skills. Rather than butchering a topic that most high school students do a better job covering in their college essays than I ever could, I’ll just stick to the basics (aka things I have written about before).


Availability of drinking water is affected by climate change anyway you look at it. With farm runoff, population growth and urbanization, crazy weather patterns, melting ice, whatever it is that climate change is doing, drinking water is in high demand and dwindling supply. According to a 2006 World Health Organization (WHO) report, “More than 1.1 billion people in both urban and rural areas currently lack access to drinking water from an improved source” furthermore “WHO estimates that in 2005, 1.6 million children under age 5 (an average of 4500 every day) died from the consequences of unsafe water and inadequate hygiene.” The magnitude of the drinking water access problem is overwhelming. Where on earth does one begin to put their drop in the proverbial bucket? I started with a Google search and found something that might be able to help until somebody much smarter, much more knowledgeable about water, disease, and basically science than I comes up with a permanent solution to the clean water access disparity.


I found a product called PUR. I admit that I have kind of a product crush on these water purification packets. They are just so cool, simple, and easy to get where they need to go. They are little packets of powder that can remove dirt, 99.9% of intestinal bacteria, intestinal viruses, and protozoa from 10 liters of water at a time (P&G 2009). The packets, cost $00.10 each. I recommend checking out the PUR website. http://www.csdw.org/csdw/index.html


To raise money to send these awesome little packets around the world, I made some t-shirts with a bean sprout print and put them for sale in my freshly created Etsy store. http://slowoveralls.etsy.com


In the Blog Action Day promo video it asks what difference one blog can make and then goes on to remind us that luckily we are not alone. What a fabulous reminder to have when facing overwhelming global issues! So here is my drop in the bucket.


In the words of the late Albus Dumbledore “We are only as strong as we are united”