LifeStraw – Clean Water for $2 – Kill Disease As You Drink

On September 8, 2000 world leaders met at the UN headquarters in New York City for the Millennium Summit. During this meeting 189 countries agreed to attempt to reach 8 goals by 2015. More on the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) can be found here. The goals are as follows:

1.) Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
2.) Achieve universal primary education
3.) Promote gender equality and empower women
4.) Reduce child mortality
5.) Improve maternal health
6.) Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases
7.) Ensure environmental sustainability
8.) Develop a global partnership for development

One of the newest products that was built with the sense of urgency the Millennium Summit’s MDG helped to articulate is LifeStraw. Today, over 1 billion people have limited or no access to clean water. Naturally, access to clean water is an essential and through technology Vestergaard Frandsen is able to provide thousands of liters of drinkable water for less than a cup of coffee.

LifeStraw is a personal portable instant water filtration system. Water is sucked through a series of mesh filters, iodine coated beads to kill bacteria and active carbon. The chambers in the flute like device are able to clean the water and eliminate bacteria. How big of a problem does this address? 6,000 people die everyday due to no access to clean water – these are mainly children.

When I was working for the World Banks’ Africa Region I was introduced to many of the trials and tribulations of the countries and it is overwhelming. I’m pleased to see innovative designs like LifeStraw and LifeStraw Family.

If you have interest in helping a family of 5 get clean drinking water for a year for only $15, donations can be made to the Rotary Club of Ft. Lauderdale Florida. Here is a photo of the LifeStraw Family system.