“According to The Global Soap Project’s (GSP) website, 1.8 million people around the world die every year from diseases that could have been prevented through hand washing with soap. Young children benefit the most, because soap can kill the germs that cause pneumonia and diarrhea – two of the most prevalent killers of children younger than 5.

According to GSP, U.S. hotels throw away around 2.6 million bars of soap every day. Those half-used bars, Kayongo said, may seem useless, but if put in the right hands they can prevent death.

“When you see people getting diarrhea, falling sick all of the time, you start to see the power of this little product,” said Kayongo, who began asking hotels for their used soap bars once he learned they were just tossing them in the trash.

Today, more than 5,000 hotels participate in GSP by boxing used soaps and sending them to GSP and its nonprofit partner, Clean the World, where they go through a sorting, sterilizing and molding process.

Both organizations work with the Center for Disease Control to determine where the soap should be shipped. Up to now, 32 countries have received the second-life bars, distributing them to homeless shelters, refugees, disaster victims and people living in extreme poverty.” …