| PUR® Purifier of Water is a product developed
by Proctor and Gamble for sale at no-profit to users
and NGOs. The product is a small sachet containing powdered
ferrous sulfate (a flocculant) and calcium hypochlorite
(a disinfectant). To use PUR®, users open the sachet,
add the contents to 10 liters of water, stir for 5 minutes,
let the solids settle to the bottom of the bucket, strain
the water through a cotton cloth into a second bucket,
and wait 20 minutes for the hypochlorite to inactivate
the microorganisms. PUR was designed to reverse engineer
a large-scale water treatment plant, incorporating the
multiple barrier processes of removal of particles and
disinfection. Because of this dual process treatment,
PUR® has high removal of bacteria viruses and parasites
even in highly turbid waters. PUR® has been documented
to reduce diarrheal disease incidence by 16 to greater
than 90% in five randomized, controlled health intervention
studies
P&G is investigating social marketing with PSI
in Haiti, Kenya, Pakistan, and Uganda, and emergency
response as mechanisms for implementation of PUR.
300,000 PUR® sachets were distributed in response
to the flooding after Hurricane Jeanne struck Gonaives,
Haiti in September 2004. Up until the 2004 tsunami
in Asia, 5 million sachets of PUR had been procured
for emergency response. Over 16 million sachets have
to date been purchased and transported to the tsunami
affected areas of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives.
CDC has worked with P&G to study the efficacy
of PUR®, as well as evaluate different implementation
strategies. Get more information about the PUR®
project.
 A
sachet of PUR®.
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