What does meeting the Millennium Development Goal on safe drinking water mean and what does KONY have to do with it?

For one, it is a reason to celebrate given that 6.1 billion people - 89% of the population and 1% more than the target - have gained access to improved drinking water sources ahead of schedule.

The Unicef joint monitoring programme for water supply and sanitation (JMP) cautions that data does not assess the quality, or reliability of the water supply, or whether water sources were sustainable. JMP also noted that  11% of the world's population – 783 million people – are still without access to safe water, and the MDG target to improve basic sanitation, such as access to latrines and hygienic waste collection, is still far from being met.

We also have to be mindful of where the improvements have happened, that being rapidly developing nations like China, India and urban areas vs. chronically impoverished and rural regions. More than 40% of all people globally who lack access to drinking water live in sub-Saharan Africa.

Roughly 2.5 billion people still lack basic sanitation and it is predicted that the target will not be reached globally until 2026. Sanitation remains a difficult issue to package in an attractive campaign despite affecting more people, and leading to more deaths (2 million people die every year due to diarrhoeal diseases, mostly young kids).

Other barriers include: lack of financial resources, lack of sustainability of water supply and sanitation services, poor hygiene behaviours, and inadequate sanitation in public places including hospitals, health centres and schools.

Meeting the target means that the MDGs can be met, we just have to keep on going. Unlike the KONY campaign, this is not flashy, there isn't one single bad guy we need to conquer to make it all better, and it will take more effort than wearing a bracelet.