We all warm ourselves by fires we did not build and
drink water from wells we did not dig.
—Robert Lawrence Smith
There is an unconscionable disparity—and egregious inequity—between the way that we live and the way the people of the developing world live.
There are also endless possibilities for helping these distant neighbors of ours improve the quality of their lives.
Here's an example.
Having been to Bangladesh, I can tell you that this morning a neighbor of ours there—a young mother—was making her way through the crowded capital city of Dhaka (a city of at least 400,000 rickshaws).
She was worried because the baby in her arms was dangerously dehydrated from diarrhea. Diarrhea has been one of the biggest killers of children around the globe, and Bangladesh has had one of the highest child mortality rates in the world.
Can we really impact such immense problems?
The answer is yes.
By tonight that mother in Dhaka—the one rushing her baby to the hospital—will most likely be at home in bed with her baby sound asleep beside her.
I saw dozens of mothers just like her at that hospital in Dhaka.
Thanks to some impressive science, international cooperation, and a process called oral rehydration, 95 percent of those babies leave the hospital just fine.
Doctors rehydrate these babies' intestines by giving them a solution to drink that consists of little more than water and salt and sugar. Every year that process spares millions of families the unspeakable pain of losing a child.
The International Center for Diarrheal Disease Research, Bangladesh, pioneered oral rehydration. Then a group called the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee took it out into the field to 13 million mothers. As a result, the infant death rate in Bangladesh has dropped dramatically.
It appears that soon there will be a vaccine available to protect children from the scourge of diarrhea.
All this shows that when we put our best minds to the task and work together, we can help our neighbors solve some seemingly impossible problems.
And it suggests that sometimes when we do this, unexpected blessings flow back our way.
I say that because the miracles worked by this simple life-saving solution didn't end in the world's poorest countries—and mothers and fathers everywhere should be celebrating that fact.
Today when babies in Los Angeles or London become dehydrated from diarrhea or the stomach flu, their parents are often told by the doctor to treat them with a similar electrolyte solution that happens to be available to them under brand names such as Pedialyte.
American moms and dads can buy it right off the shelves of their neighborhood supermarket—thanks in part to the same life-changing research that began in Bangladesh.