The United Nations Environment Program has cautioned that water pollution across three continents- Asia, Africa, and Latin America is risking millions of people of dangerous diseases like typhoid and cholera.

A report from the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), Snapshot of the World's Water Quality, has highlighted a "worrying rise in the contamination of surface waters in Asia, Africa, and Latin America" which poses a great risk of contracting diseases for a huge number of individuals, and additionally threatening to damage our food chain, thereby affecting the continents' economies.  The authors of this report also pointed out that by making clean water less, the disparity amongst the people would continue to grow and this would make the poor, children and women vulnerable.

The report highlights a series of catalysts which are causing the rise in surface water pollution, including factors such as population growth, economic expansion, intensive farming, and most importantly, an increase in the amount of untreated sewage which is getting discharged into local water bodies. In particular, pathogen pollution and organic pollution have risen by a whopping 50% in the past two decades across Asia, Africa and Latin America.

With a few nations' populations depending on surface waters as their drinking water (to the tune of 90%), this present an immediate health hazard. This problem is likely to intensify, thereby worsening the condition further. The report found that about 3.4 million people die every year from diseases related to contaminated water consumption, for example, cholera, typhoid, hepatitis, polio, cryptosporidiosis, ascariasis, and diarrheal diseases. Estimates by UNEP reveal that up to 25 million people are at risk from such diseases in Latin America, up to 164 million in Africa, and up to 134 million in Asia. 

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