Greg Allgood: Drinking Water Miracle Worker
One billion people without access to clean water. Four thousand child deaths a day because of water-borne diseases. Most of us hear those statistics and shake our heads. Greg Allgood took action.
Allgood (a fitting name if ever there was one), a public-health specialist at Cincinnati-based Proctor & Gamble, led a team that developed what can only be described as a miracle powder: an inexpensive concoction that, with a little stirring and time, causes impurities in water to coagulate and settle to the bottom. Not just “regular” impurities like particles of dirt or even bacteria, but parasites like cryptosporidium and giardia, which can cause severe — sometimes fatal — intestinal illnesses.
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This week, the PUR water purifier was named one of Popular Mechanics’ Top 10 World-Changing Innovations of the Year. It’s an honor that’s well deserved.
Allgood did more than help develop a miraculous life-saver, though: he convinced Proctor & Gamble not to stop making it after the powder didn’t prove profitable enough. Instead, Allgood persuaded the company to create a not-for-profit unit: the Children’s Safe Drinking Water program. The unit has since helped relief organizations around the globe provide people with more than one billion liters of clean, safe drinking water.
Allgood himself travels around the world to hand out packets of PUR and teach people how to use them to make sure their water is safe to drink. He’s been blogging about his experiences since 2005, and his posts make for fascinating reading.
Be sure to check out the PUR Packet link at the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Website to see this amazing powder in action — it’s awesome.
This is pretty cool. I do some work with the American Chemistry Council on their 100 Years of Safe Drinking Water campaign, and it’s exciting to see developments like this. Here in the U.S., we’ve been using chlorine to make our water supply systems safe for 100 years because it’s so safe and effective. But obviously not every nation can afford it, so I’m encouraged to see that before developing nations can build chlorinated drinking systems, they can use this powder.
[...] introduced into the natural world will remain for many generations. Although, big props for the the PUR water purifier), and therefore (my BIG idea!) am asking my readers to log on to ILoveGain.com, head to the [...]
Dear Greg,
I find it ironic that Protor & Gamble,a company that I have been boycotting for 30 years because I believe kindness to animals is the first step to kindness to each other, is cradling a man who has developed a economical water purifier to save the lives of millions of children. I want to help. I am immediate past president of Kiwanis of La Canada, CA. (Kiwanis International, along with UNICEF, is responsible for stamping out Iodine Deficiency Disease) After I eat my hat, I want to organize delivery of your miracle. Please advise. God Bless you. Diane
[...] last century, most people had very limited diets for much of the year. The bigger issue was that nutrient deficiencies caused serious health problems in many places because the locally available food didn’t [...]