Among those affected were between 6,000 to 12,000 children, who are particularly susceptible to the irreversible effects.
In Faizullah’s “I Told the Water,” she examines how water is both essential to life and often overlooked.
“Even if you consume something like water, you have no idea necessarily what its contents are or what [it] is going to do to you.” In April 2014, city officials switched the source of Flint’s water supply from the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department over to the Flint River to cut costs.
Due to improper water treatment and natural corrosion from old pipes , Flint’s water supply was exposed to heavy levels of lead contamination.
It’s been four years since Flint’s crisis began, and some residents still live without access to potable water, and the water at some schools still tests above the federal threshold some of the time.
To provide students and others bottled water, the state of Michigan currently shells out $22,000 a day.
Faizullah, a second-generation Bangladeshi, said her interest in water and the allocation of essential resources is “obsessive,” and draws inspiration from Bangladesh’s own struggle with water.
Millions are currently water insecure, and research conducted by World Bank predicts that climate change will decrease the country’s already scarce clean water supply.
“I Told the Water,” from Registers of Illuminated Villages, copyright © 2018 by Tarfia Faizullah.
Her second book is Registers of Illuminated Villages (Graywolf Press, 2018).