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The right to the highest attainable standard of health was enshrined in WHO’s constitution
over 50 years ago, and recognized as a human right in article 12.1 of the International
Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.This right extends to the underlying determinants
of health; central among these are safe water and adequate sanitation.
Yet we have entered the new millennium with one of the most fundamental conditions of
human development unmet: universal access to water. Of the world’s 6 billion people, at least
1.1 billion lack access to safe drinking-water.The lives of these people who are among the poorest
on our planet are often devastated by this deprivation, which impedes the enjoyment of
health and other human rights such as the right to food and to adequate housing.
Water is the essence of life and human dignity.Water is fundamental to poverty reduction, providing
people with elements essential to their growth and development. Recently, the Committee
on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which monitors the implementation of the Covenant,
adopted General Comment No. 15 in which water is recognized, not only as a limited natural
resource and a public good but also as a human right.The right to water entitles everyone to
sufficient, safe, acceptable, physically accessible and affordable water, and it must be enjoyed without
discrimination and equally by women and men.
At the Millennium Summit, States agreed to halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without
access to safe drinking-water.We are pleased to issue this publication as a contribution to the
International Year of Freshwater, celebrated worldwide throughout 2003 as an immense opportunity
to highlight and promote the right to water as a fundamental human right.