Remember drinking fountains?

 While viewing one of those iconic photographs of a Black man drinking out of a “colored only” water fountain, it occurred to me: Are water fountains still around? They used to be ubiquitous. Now it seems that everybody buys their water in plastic bottles. In 2021, 15.3 billion gallons of bottled water were sold in the U.S. Between 2010 and 2020, bottled water production grew by 73 percent.

As to plastic bottles themselves, around the world almost one million plastic bottles are purchased every minute—a situation having a devastating effect on the environment. Picture this: every day the number of bottles sold around the world would make up a pile half the size of the Eiffel Tower. (Only 6 percent are recycled.) 

I don’t get why people buy bottled water. You can get it out of your tap! If you need to take water with you, fill up your thermos or whatever! I don’t know what the experts say, but I fault two sources for this problem: 1) the persistent myth that you need to stay “hydrated” by drinking eight glasses of water a day (there’s no scientific evidence for this notion); and 2) the bottled water industry, which keeps the myth alive by sponsoring “public service” messages—such as the Evian-sponsored Hydration for Health campaign.

I have no data for this, but I think that people are scared to drink from a public fountain—if they could find one.

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