IRAQ, Ibrahim's Story
In a ward of the children's hospital in Basra, Iraq, nine-month-old Ibrahim is in a deep sleep. His mother, Wedad, sits beside him fanning his face. "He is so weak and dry," Wedad says. "He had 15 bouts of diarrhea last month. I've done everything I can to help him, but he is still ill."
Ibrahim's three-year-old brother was also suffering from diarrhea, but he recovered enough to join his father at home.
UNICEF/ HQ03-0515/Shehzad Noorani
Life is tough for the whole family. Ibrahim's father has no regular work and it is difficult to get enough food. But the biggest problem is the shortage of clean drinking water.
"The water [the children] bathe in and which I use to prepare food comes direct from the tap," says Ibrahim's mother, Wedad. "It tastes bad and has a strange color, but what can you do?"
Every second day, Wedad buys five liters of water from a private water tankering company. "I keep it for the children to drink but it's never enough," she says. "The water they bathe in and which I use to prepare food comes direct from the tap. It tastes bad and has a strange color, but what can you do?"
Ibrahim's story was filed by UNICEF in May 2003. Years of under-investment, more than 12 years of sanctions and two wars had left Iraq's water system in a bad state of repair. After the most recent conflict, vital equipment was looted from many pumping stations and water-treatment plants.
In the face of increasing health risks to children such as Ibrahim, water and sanitation became the top priority, and the water supply and sanitation operation in Iraq in 2003 was the largest ever undertaken by UNICEF. At its peak, UNICEF was providing 14.6 million liters of water daily to over 825,000 people. Urgent work continues to distribute emergency water supplies, repair water and sewage systems, and supply new equipment.
