Two billion tons of human and animal waste and industrial pollution are dumped into waterways every day around the world, according to reports released today in Nairobi, Kenya, for the 17th annual World Water Day—a day the United Nations (UN) dedicates to raising awareness of the water quantity and quality challenges facing the planet.



“Wastewater—you’re literally swimming in it,” said David Osborn, the primary study author of the UN Environment Program’s (UNEP) report, Sick Water. Osborn and his UNEP colleagues single out sewage and animal waste as the biggest source of global water pollution, flushing pathogens and an overdose of nutrients and sediments into rivers and lakes, and out to sea.

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