Beyond Water Scarcity: Urban Water Inequity and Public Health in Karachi, Pakistan

Global Health Speaker Series 2024-2025

Wednesday, April 16, 2025

Across South Asian megacities, rapid urbanization, climatic change, and weak water governance, have created acute water stress, especially among marginalized groups. Drawing on two recent studies from Karachi, Pakistan, this talk examines how structural inequalities and administrative fragmentation produce severe disparities in access to water and sanitation. The talk will highlight how legal recognition, social capital, and community mobilization shape residents’ ability to secure basic services. The talk also foregrounds the lived experiences of residents in underserved neighborhoods, revealing how uneven patterns of water and sanitation access have profound implications for public health, shaping exposure to disease, reinforcing health disparities, and undermining the urban poor’s ability to achieve basic well-being.

Hassaan Khan
Tufts University Department of Urban and Environmental Policy