The Human Waste Crisis

Again, from The Economist:

Two-fifths of the world’s population has nowhere to defecate except open ground. That is 2.6 billion people whose drinking water contains their and their neighbour’s faeces; whose food is contaminated by the flies that lay their eggs in human waste; who live in filth and very often die because of it. And yet this particular curse of poverty is all too often overlooked. Politicians and celebrities are enamoured of “clean water”—but less keen on posing next to the latrines that must be built to keep water that way.

Image Source: Composting Toilet & Latrine Technology in Developing Countries

The Economist's article, a review of The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters by Rose George, makes the point that we don't talk enough and don't worry enough about the disposal of human waste, which is a killing problem in developing nations and an increasing one in water scarce developed nations. This is a topic that deserves much more research and development.