cleaner water slashes cancer and heart disease deaths/ Environmental news

 Title : Lower Arsenic in Drinking Water Reduces Death Risk, Even After Years of Chronic Exposure

 Date: November 17, 2025

Source: Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health

Authors: Ana Navas-Acien , Joseph H. Graziano

 

Page : N/A/ online article 

 

Link : https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/lower-arsenic-drinking-water-reduces-death-risk-even-after-years-chronic-exposure

 

Summary :

A new 20 year study on almost 11,000 adults in Bangladesh shows that when people stopped drinking water with arsenic, their risk disease dropped a lot. The study was done by researchers from Columbia University and other schools and it was published in JAMA. Arsenic is a toxic chemical that can be in groundwater. It has no taste at all or it even does not have any smells, so people can drink it for years without knowing. In Bangladesh, about 50 million people were exposed to unsafe arsenic levels. During the study, many families switched to safer wells, and arsenic levels in their bodies dropped by about 50%. The people who switched to clean water had much lower risk of death.

One of the researchers, Lex van Geen, said, “You’re not just preventing deaths from future exposure, but also from past exposure.” Another researcher said that the drop in deaths from cancer and heart disease shows how powerful clean water really is. “Seeing that our work helped sharply reduce deaths from cancer and heart disease, I realized the impact reaches far beyond our study to millions in Bangladesh and beyond now drinking water low in arsenic,” said Joseph Graziano.

A 1998 New York Times story first brought us to Bangladesh. More than two decades later, this finding is deeply rewarding public health is often the ultimate delayed gratification.” 

Who: Adults in Bangladesh and international researchers
What: A long study about arsenic in drinking water and health
Where: Araihazar, Bangladesh
When: From 2000 to 2022 (20 years)
Why: To see if reducing arsenic in water can lower the risk of death

 

My thoughts:

 I think this study is very important and also very scary. It is shocking that so many people were drinking poisoned water without knowing it. But at the same time it gives hope because the study shows that when people switch to clean water, their health can get better. I liked the quote that said they are preventing deaths from both past and future exposure, because it shows it is never too late to fix things. Clean drinking water should be a basic right for everyone. This made me realize how lucky I am to have safe water and how serious this problem still is in many countries. Governments and public health should think more of this issue. They should ask themselves would I drink the same water that has arsenic in it ? Or I would want to drink a safe and clean water. If their answer is they do not really want to drink arsenic water so they should not allow people to drink from those unhealthy water that would increase the danger of death and cancer. However some countries may not have access to clean water and even water is not really available for them and that is so deep to think about because we are drinking clean water , taking showers , swim and etc... without even being worried about the Blue Water Crisis. 

Reading this article helped me understand how we are drinking a healthy water or using it in our daily routines without even noticing there are some people who doesn't have the same accessbility to clean water or even water.