The Policy Implications of Contamination Of Rural Water Between Source And Point of Use in Kenya, South Africa and Zimbabwe (AQUAPOL)

This was a regional project piloted in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya. The project investigated the relationship between water quality at the point of use and health outcomes. Weights, heights and diarrhoeal morbidity of the core-children identified in the pre-survey were also measured. A more detailed report on the pilot survey is available

The major findings were:

• More contamination was detected in the water drawn from unprotected wells than from boreholes and deep wells
• Groundwater sampling procedures indicated that there was some contamination of the ground water during collection, before it even reached the home
• Although some coliforms were detected in nearly all of the unprotected water sources, coliforms were not detected in any of the protected sources
• When the household water was compared with the source water, there appeared to be an increase in total coliform counts in the stored water relative to the source water. However, this trend was not uniform as in some cases the counts decreased in the stored water and cup samples relative to the source water
• The results of the coliforms investigations also pointed to the same trend where there was an increase in the microbial counts from source to storage vessel to scooping device
• Water was collected frequently and it was rarely treated post- collection
• There was a low sanitation coverage and hand washing was often done as a routine especially just before eating, cooking, while taking a bath and so on
• Although the container used to transport water was often the storage container as well, its cleaning behaviours varied widely

These trends could be due to the water collection, storage and hygiene behaviours in the community

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