Bangladesh's women and children bear burden of humanitarian crisis: Report
Dhaka, July 19
Millions of people are struggling in Bangladesh's south-west coast for safe drinking water as ponds, tube wells and other water sources have been rendered undrinkable by severe salinity, stated a report.
Women walk for miles holding plastic containers in search of safe drinking water, and this is not just an environmental issue but a full-blown public health emergency, a report from 'Pressenza-International Press Agency' stated.
"The environmental disasters hitting this coastline do not occur in isolation. Salinity intrusion, frequent cyclones, destructive storm surges, riverbank erosion, permanent waterlogging, and extreme heat waves continuously reinforce one another. When a household loses its crops or fishing income to rising salinity, the cost of simple survival skyrockets," noted the report
According to it, the families are also forced to spend a lot of their already small income just to procure water because the transport infrastructure is broken, along with routinely delayed medical care.
"The heaviest burden of this humanitarian crisis falls squarely on women and adolescent girls, who bear the primary responsibility for household water collection. Recent field data and studies show that women walk between two and five kilometres every day just to find safe water. This chore consumes several valuable hours daily- time stripped away from education, income generation, rest, and personal care," the report stressed.
The report said water-dependent occupations combined with long distances to health facilities significantly heighten reproductive health risks, citing a 2025 study conducted in Gabura Union.
"Women working in shrimp-fry collection and aquaculture spend hours standing hip-deep in saline water. As a result, coastal women are facing alarming rates of skin infections, urinary tract infections, and long-term reproductive health complications," it added.
According to the report, the Government and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) came up with several interventions, like rainwater harvesting tanks and pond-sand filters (PSFs), to reverse osmosis plants and temporary health camps, but with a lack of long-term maintenance funds and reliable backup sources, the infrastructure worth millions of dollars is now abandoned or broken.
"The reality on the ground proves that isolated charitable activities cannot solve this systemic crisis," said the report by Pressenza.
— IANS
Reader Comments
The report is spot-on about systemic failure. We've seen similar issues in coastal Tamil Nadu and West Bengal—salinity intrusion is not a new problem. But blaming nature alone isn't enough. Bangladesh has shown tremendous resilience in disaster management, but the focus must shift to long-term water security and health infrastructure. Women can't wait for monsoon every year.
It's shocking that millions of dollars in aid infrastructure is abandoned. This isn't just a South Asian problem—it's a global failure of climate adaptation. The West needs to step up with predictable funding and technology transfer. Otherwise, we'll keep reading about women suffering on these coastlines every year.
I'm saddened but not surprised. As a woman from a coastal city, I know how water collection eats into women's time—time for school, work, or just rest. The reproductive health risks mentioned are a silent crisis. We need better data sharing and cross-border knowledge exchange between India and Bangladesh on affordable desalination and rainwater harvesting.
A full-blown public health emergency indeed. The combo of cyclones, salinity, and lack of clean water is a recipe for waterborne diseases and maternal mortality. It's great that the Pressenza report highlights this, but I worry that without sustained international pressure, the story will fade. The children deserve better.
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