A global view of the planet

Ban Ki-Moon on polio
United Nations Secretary-General

For 23 years, the Rotarians have dedicated their time and efforts to eradicating polio. They have done so in the face of extraordinary challenges. They have overcome financial shortfalls, conflict, and lack of security. They have conquered cultural barriers and lack of political will.

At every turn, in the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles, the Rotarians have found creative solutions, in partnership with the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In this way, Rotarians have shown the world what can be achieved when civil society and the United Nations partner together.

When the last chapter on polio eradication is finally written, it will tell one of the most spectacular success stories in public health. It will describe one of the world’s most remarkable partnerships. And it will highlight the Rotarians’ personal service to humanity.

Today, Rotary’s leadership is more critical than ever. Its determination and generosity will drive us to the finish line in our race against polio. I know Rotarians will go the distance. And I will be with you every step of the way.

Bill McKibben on water
Environmentalist and author of Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future

Water is the most basic substance on the planet. As a result, we take it for granted, when it’s precisely the thing we should worry most about.

Especially now. Water is already in short supply: Irrigation wells increasingly come up empty in the Punjab and the North China Plain and the American Plains, the world’s key grain-growing regions. (It’s so bad in China that they’re trying to divert the country’s biggest river 1,000 miles to the north). American cities like Atlanta find themselves scrambling for water when drought hits. And every indication is that these shortages will get much worse. Warmer weather is melting glaciers across the tropics and temperate latitudes – in huge parts of Asia and South America. Those glaciers provide the drinking water that hundreds of millions depend on. Some global warming forecasts predict that, with evaporation increasing, the great lakes behind our western dams will never fully fill again.

And so it is past time to realize just how sweet all that water is, and to vow that we’ll do what we need to in order to safeguard the supply – whether that’s plugging leaks, or learning to live with the kind of lawns our rainfall can support, or taking real action to head off climate change. We have no real choice.

Scott Turow on literacy
Lawyer and author of Presumed Innocent and Limitations

I have long been involved with Literary Chicago, the charitable organization in Chicago that teaches adult learners to read. In my contacts with LC, I am always overwhelmed by two things: the fact that there are still so many Americans who do not read at all (or without even rudimentary proficiency), and the realization of what it would mean to be unlettered in this society. I have a clear memory of the moment that I realized I could read. My mother was steering her Chevrolet into a space on Howard Street and I realized that the red and white rectangle on a pole some distance in front of her read “No Parking.” An entire realm of adult activity –why we were here and not there, what she was looking for as she cruised up and down, what my father and she seemed concerned about when they brought their cars to the curb – was suddenly comprehensible to me. I am always staggered to contemplate what life would be without that ability to decode. The most basic tasks – parking or driving a car, getting on the right train, dealing with the bank – would be a constant challenge. Furthermore, because literacy is so widespread, and because it is, generally speaking, a skill acquired by six-year-olds, a special shame inheres in admitting to an inability to read. For that reason, I am always full of admiration when I meet the adult learners who have taken advantage of the services LC offers and have gone week after week to meet with the generous tutors who volunteer to help. The tutors are heroic – patient, skillful, and dedicated. But the people who have the courage to admit that they cannot do something that most children can – that kind of willingness to change and grow as adults – inevitably moves me to tears.

In this society, we are fond of saying that the value of literacy is declining. We live, supposedly, in a visual culture. But the reality, of course, is that the ability to read and write remains the Mandarin skill. CEOs, judges, political leaders rule not by conjuring imagery but with written directives to the rest of us. As the quality of public education declines, we are separated in America by yet one more barrier: by those who read and write well enough to address the rest of us and by those who do not.

Michael Crichton on public health
Doctor, screenwriter, and author of Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, and Next

Improving the health of people in developing countries is the great humanitarian and environmental challenge of the first part of the 21st century. One of the most important and least expensive steps is to supply clean water to roughly one billion people around the world who don’t have it. We don’t often realize the degree to which poor health drags at the efforts of emerging nations to attain decent standards of living and education. Sick adults can’t work and can’t grow food. Sick children can’t attend school, or they may have to tend a sick adult; in any case, literacy suffers. And the death toll is staggering: Almost two million children and some 10 to 25 million adults die of waterborne illness every year. Right now, 95 percent of the deaths of children under five are caused by waterborne disease. In all, more than 30,000 people die every day from lack of clean water. There is no reason for us in the developed world to be intimidated by these statistics, and every reason why we should be embarrassed. Improving the water supply is one public health action where costs are relatively low and great progress has already been made. According to the UN, more than one billion people have gotten improved water in the last 14 years; the remaining billion could be served at a cost of less than US$10 billion a year – Western nations spend four times that amount on hair-care products alone. In addition, this is also an area where private philanthropy can have a dramatic impact – household by household, village by village. Individually and collectively, we in the wealthy nations have no excuse for not acting. Everyone on the globe should have clean water. We can see that it happens.