Completed: November 2022
Serves: 245 people

Some of Shitirira Community’s 245 people live an hour’s walk from John Murumba Spring, which is their only option for water. This is because John Murumba Spring is the only water point in the area that continues flowing through the dry season.

With multiple trips’ worth of water needed each day, community members can waste an inordinate amount of time just getting the water they need to drink and accomplish daily tasks like cooking and cleaning.

“In my own family, my husband has been taking medicine for typhoid [for] almost one year now without recovering,” said Elizabeth J., 46, a local businesswoman. “He is not recovering. We are using a lot of money on medication.”

In this community, Elizabeth’s story isn’t unique. Nearly every community member who was spoken with mentioned being unable to afford the high costs of medication.

Completed: November 2022
Serves: 200 people

The lines to fetch water at Benson Lumbasi Spring get so long that sometimes people give up and go home. But water is essential for cooking, cleaning, and farming, not to mention drinking and staying alive. With all the time wasted in line, one would hope the water from the spring would at least be of good quality. Instead, it infects community members — especially children and the elderly — with sometimes-deadly infections like cholera and typhoid.