COVID-19: HOW WE'RE RESPONDING

Communities in developing countries, like Nepal, have virtually one defense against critical illness and death from COVID-19: Prevention.
Gravity Water has launched its 2020 Community Preparedness Plan, assisting communities through ensuring health through safe water access and preventing exposure through implementing best-practices for hygiene at schools.

Every $5 raised provides one child and their family with a 12-month supply of hand soap (14 bars)
Join our team as a fundraiser below or make a donation towards our goal of providing 1,900 children and families in Nepal with a 12-month supply of hand soap.

SUPPORT A SPECIFIC SCHOOL CAMPAIGN

The current pandemic caused by COVID-19 (aka "coronavirus") has dramatically impacted millions of people's lives around the world. Though there's much to be learned about the virus and its impact on human health, one thing is clear: the virus can cause critical illness and death at an alarming rate, and there are measures that both communities and individuals can take to reduce this risk. 

For some countries, such as Belgium, Italy, and the United Kingdom, the death rate has been significantly larger (>13% of total cases in each country), than countries like Switzerland, Germany, and Canada (<5% of total cases in each country). One of the reasons these differences exist is due to the ratio of access to advanced medical equipment, such as ventilators and ICU equipment, to number of individuals requiring them.​

A child watches a local community member build the foundation for a 2,000 liter water tank at Koseli School in Kathmandu, Nepal

In developing countries, access to advanced medical supplies is exponentially lower than in developed countries. For example, Kathmandu, Nepal, a large city of 1.7 million people, has only a handful of ICU beds per hospital, and only a handful of developed hospitals throughout the city. Outside the nation's capitol, access to ICU's are virtually non-existent. With extremely limited access to advanced medical technologies and ICU's, COVID-19 is likely to create devastating outcomes for developing countries over the next few years.
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Preventing critical illness from COVID-19 can be done through limiting the exposure of the virus to high-risk individuals, such as those with pre-existing medical conditions or compromised immune systems, and through promoting healthy practices and preventing otherwise-healthy individuals from having compromised immune systems.

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Ensuring Health: How Access to Clean Water Relates to COVID-19

​Most communities in Nepal, Vietnam, and Indonesia access an improve drinking water source through boiling water or purchasing bottled water. Unfortunately, most schools in these communities can't afford to offer safe drinking to their students, requiring children to rely on contaminated water from the school's taps as their primary drinking water source. When individuals drink contaminated water, bacteria and other pathogens, enter the human body, causing illness. Though this illness can range from severe cases, such as gastroenteritis or cholera, it can also manifest subtly, as a common parasite or mild diarrhea. Regardless of how infections manifest, they all require individual's immune system to operate at full-capacity to keep the person healthy. When these individuals get a virus, such as COVID-19, while experiencing gastrointestinal illness, their risk of infection and critical outcomes are greatly increased.

Local community members setting up the filtration for a Gravity Water system at Shree Bal Kalyan School in Kavrepalanchok, Nepal.

Through installing safe drinking water systems in high-risk communities, Gravity Water aims at keeping community members healthy, preparing them to have strong immune defense systems if and when they do contract COVID-19.

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Preventing Exposure: Implementing Best-Practices for Hygiene at Schools

Most of the communities Gravity Water works with are composed of families who work remotely, either on their own property or through a self-owned business. Therefore, many of these community members aren't at as high of an increased risk of spreading COVID-19, or being in exposure to contracting the virus, as many western occupations that involve high levels human-to-human interactions.
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However, most communities are centered around a single school, where the children of every household come together in close proximity every day. Thus, schools serve as one of the highest-risk locations for the spread of COVID-19 on a community-scale. Though children aren't at as high of a risk of serious illness from the disease, they do have the ability to spread the virus, especially from a sick family member to other children.  Though most schools have a place for children to wash their hands, the majority of them don't have soap for the students to use.

​Ensuring that the children of these communities have access to safe drinking water, reducing their risk of being symptomatic and spreading COVID-19 at a higher rate, and ensuring the children have adequate access to soap and hygiene education at school is vital in reducing community based transmission.​

Children at Shree Swasthani School in Kavrepalanchok, Nepal, washing their hands. Gravity Water aims at making sure all schools have access to soap.

Gravity Water is working with their pre-existing partnering schools in Vietnam, Nepal, and Indonesia, to ensure every school has access to adequate hand soap and hygiene educational materials. Gravity Water will also be focusing on ensuring access to hand soap for all future schools that they partner with for clean water access throughout the immediate future. 
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