Recently a month back - while I was
on a casual call with my father, he mentioned that with our bore water - a
significant amount white substance is forming like a layer at top of the vessel
while they are boiling the water for
drinking. And he asked me, is it a concern? I was Subtle and couldn’t answer
him anything instead advised to purchase bottled water (R.O. Filtered) from any
nearest source. Since it is a remote village (unlike in cities), they have to
travel some distance to the nearest R.O. water plant to collect the water-can with their own arrangements on
daily basis is a little bit of burden.
Drinking water
quality is one of main suspect for high prevalence of kidney disease at my
native place. The local state government also has some focus by initiating ‘stopCKD’ campaign to prevent new cases. Under this programme, the officials washed
their hands by advising the villagers to change their food habits and consume
purified drinking water and looks like there it ends! Further, an in-depth study
would have been conducted to examine the incidence of kidney disease and there is any
connection with the potable chemical water quality in this affected region
(sorry if it is being done but I am not aware of).
Now coming back to understand the
water issue at my village, I have ordered a TDS meter to check the quality of
the water. TDS Meter is simple device used to measure Total Dissolved Solids in
a particular source of water. After getting the meter, my father checked our
bore water and it was showing 970 reading which is considerably high and likely
close to unfit for drinking.
Is the water
unfit for drinking If TDS is High?
Water with high TDS is not always un-safe
to drink.
|
TDS
Level in parts per million(ppm) |
Palatability
Quotient |
|
150-250 |
Good |
|
250-300 |
Fair |
|
300-500 |
Poor |
|
Above
1200 |
Unacceptable |
However, some substances such as arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd),
lead (Pb), and uranium (U) are nephrotoxic elements can lead to health hazards
and may cause kidney failure in long run.
So, now to decide whether our water
with 970+ TDS is safe or unsafe, we have to further analyze its chemical
composition. But individually its difficult to get such tests done from a remote
rural location.
So what?
Appeal to the government authorities:
Uddanam region (with several mandals
such as Ichchapuram, Sompeta, Kaviti, Palasa, Mandasa and Vajrapukotturu and
Meliyaputti) is IDENTIFIED as high prevalence of CKD, so the concerned
authorities shall conduct….
The study for investigating the
water quality of the groundwater that shall be collected from all the above
areas to assess its suitability for drinking purposes by doing TDS, Detailed chemical
composition for identifying the existence of any nephrotoxic elements in the
ground water and the PH values of the water at different segments.
If nephrotoxic elements are found,
the study of urine samples collected from individuals of that region to check
the presence of higher concentrations of any of these elements being excreted through
urine can potentially cause any damage to kidneys.
And finally, a well study based - Water
Quality Index (WQI) with emphasis on proposing appropriate drinking water
treatment method to be developed and ensure the same treatment protocol/ methodology
is followed by all the water treatment plants set up (either private / Govt) in
this region.
If all this study & research activity looks like a big task, time consuming and difficult to be coordinated, accomplished by the government, but still the Govt want to protect the people of this region from suspected water born kidney diseases, the other better option left to the government is to “ensure safe and sustainable PIPED drinking water supply from surface water sources to provide each household (or at least few connections per village) with a tap connection as it is being done in Telangana state on the name of mission – Bhagiratha”.
