Safe Water Helps Children Make the Grade
Approximately 443 million school days are lost each year due to water-related illnesses in the developing world, making it a leading factor for school absenteeism. Clean water supplies in Ethiopia have demonstrated that schools have been better able to retain children in school. Children, particularly girls, are now able to attend school and do their assignments on time since they no longer have to skip class to collect water.

Water, the Heart of Every Key Women’s Issue
The power of safe water is in its ability to transform the health and lives of women and girls. According to Wynnette LaBrosse, founder of Agora Foudation, “Water gives women their lives back; it gives girls a potential for creating their lives through education.” After a new water source was installed in a village in India through Agora, a local woman explains that prior to the new water source the contaminated water made at least one of her four children sick each month and she would have to walk seven miles to the nearest clinic. But since the new water source as installed, she hasn’t needed to take her children for medical attention. With ready access to safe water, women and girls will no longer have to spend long hours walking to distant, often polluted water sources. Instead, women can engage in income-generating activity and girls can go to school.

Wells determine the health of a village
New wells (in Uganda) helps people to see the difference safe water makes, particularly in villages and schools where there is no water. As people understand and see that their kids do not have diarrhea and they’re stomachs don’t hurt, there is an increase of support for the training of building of new wells. Ultimately, the improved health renews villages.

Ghana: Kpalime Chief Cries for Portable Water
Ghanian Chief speaks up about the effects of the lack of clean water on the region of Kpalime, Ghana. The chief advocated for the establishment of a healthy facility and new water projects to prevent further infection by water-related diseases as a result of the use of unhygienic water.

Uganda: Cholera Spreads in Nebbi
News from a Ugandan newspaper of the increasing cholera epidemic between counties. Such a spread is difficult to be scaled down because of “inadequate sensitization of the communities” and the contamination of water sources.

Testimonies from BWM site:

"Since the introduction of a well into our community, our stomach problems have completely disappeared." Bina Community (Kisumu, Kenya)

"Clean water is a powerful way to begin a large scale conversation about AIDS. The 1000 Wells Project is a simple campaign that has very little controversy surrounding it. It is difficult to argue whether or not a person should have clean water. It is also difficult to deny the equation: $1= clean water for 1 person for 1 year. And it is vital that the church begin to build relationships with African communities. When a well is built, a conversation is started, a relationship between the church and the community benefiting from the project begins. This is the seed of a worldview shift. This is what excites us about this project." Dan Haseltine of Jars of Clay

"The crisis in Africa is difficult to translate to those of us living in the states. Our hearts do not know where to begin. Of the greatest accomplishments of Bloodwater Mission has been their ability to sort through the chaos to match provision with need. Clean water prevents many diseases that can prove fatal to a person suffering from AIDS. Clean water, then, guards clean blood. The simple gift of a dollar provides invaluable clean water for one African for One year. Our calling, then, is to give from our undeserved provision into their undeserved need. In doing so, we participate in the search and rescue mission God is orchestrating in this fallen world." Donald Miller (Author)

“A well has been dug and at this time we currently have clean water. The well has helped decrease diseases at the orphanage such as malaria, typhoid and dysentery. The sanitation and hygiene for the kids has greatly improved at Mercy Home and in the community. Having clean water has also lowered expenses for medication which in turn has been diverted to feeding of the children.” Angela Namatovu (Director of Mercy Home of Children)

“In April of 2004, God placed a burden for the children of Africa in our hearts after a group of 4 men from our church made a presentation on their recent trip to Sudan. The faces of the children haunted me and broke my heart. After much prayer and wrestling, God made it clear that He desired us to adopt children from Africa and bring His orphans home. In May of 2004, we sent our paperwork to Sierra Leone, Africa to begin the process to adopt 3 year old twin sisters, Eden and Addy. We were expecting to bring them home around Christmas. However, that was not to be. On July 14, 2004, we received a phone call that forever changed us. Addy had passed away after contracting Cholera due to unsanitary drinking water. I did not know much about Cholera, so I began researching what kind of disease had taken the life of our daughter before we were ever able to hold her in our arms. When I found that Cholera is simply a bacteria that causes severe diarrhea and was contracted from her inability to get clean water, I was even more mortified that this is what had taken Addy’s life. It just seemed so senseless to us. Here in America we take for granted that we can just go to the faucet and turn on the water. We do not think twice about drinking water wherever we go. Sure, some water tastes better than other, but we never have to be concerned that the water we drink will kill us. That is simply not the case in many countries in Africa. They may haul water for miles just to have liquid to sustain life, and there is no guarantee for many of them that the water they walked miles for will not actually destroy them.

In the horrible hours and days following the news that Addy had died, we tried to make sense of such a tragedy. My heart still breaks that Eden will not grow up with her twin sister. All I have of the daughter I never got to comfort is a picture of her several months before she died and a picture of the make shift grave that her grieving family in Africa made for her in their family cemetery. However, Romans 8:28 promises that God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. God created Addy for His glory, and He will be glorified in her death as well (Isaiah 43:7). There are many more “Addys” in Africa, children in need of clean water just to survive. If we join together, we can provide wells for villages and reduce the incidence of death due to unsanitary water. Would you help make stories like Addy’s a thing of the past by helping provide funds for more wells to be drilled in Africa? For many it is a matter of life and death!” Addy’s Hope

John and HollyAnn Petree
Addy’s Hope Adoption Agency
www.addyshope.com