May 22, 2008

A group of University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Engineering and Public Health students has arrived in South America to build drinking-water wells and work on reducing water-related illness and death. The project is a partnership between students at UAB's schools of Engineering and Public Health, and the UAB chapter of the nonprofit group Engineers Without Borders. In addition to well construction, the volunteer students will teach villagers healthy water-handling tips, hygienic waste treatment, food preparation and safe irrigation.

The students are in four villages outside Iquitos, Peru, in the Amazon jungle until May 29.

Unsafe drinking water and inadequate sanitation is a public-health crisis that impacts more than a third of the planet, according to the World Health Organization. Globally it is estimated that 1.8 million people die each year from diarrhoeal diseases, with more than 80 percent of that death toll is attributed to unsafe water, sanitation and hygiene.

This is the second year UAB's Engineers Without Borders has worked in Peru.

Note: We are the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The University of Alabama is a separate campus in Tuscaloosa. It is incorrect to drop the "at Birmingham." Please use the full name on first reference and UAB thereafter.