COMPLETE SCHOOL PROJECT TOPICS & MATERIALS :
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of Study
Water is a common natural chemical substance containing two atoms of Hydrogen and an atom of Oxygen. Its common usage refers to liquid form, though has other forms: solid water- ice and gaseous forms – water vapour and steam.
Water is indispensable for life and socioeconomic development of any society. It is used in domestic activities (cooking, drinking, washing, bathing etc), agricultural activities (e.g irrigation, gardening), generation of power (hydroelectric power plants), running industries, recreational activities etc. It is very essential for human existence and sustenance of life. Water constitutes 60%-70% of the total body weight. A man can live for several days without food but will only survive for few days without water. Therefore, water is indispensable for normal physiological function of plants and animals.1 In spite of its importance in sustenance of live and livelihood, it is the major cause of morbidity and mortality because of limitations in access and quality 2,3.
The basic physiological requirement for drinking water has been estimated at about 2 litres per capita per day which is just enough for survival 4,5 .World Health Organization (WHO) states that domestic water consumption of 30-35 liters per capita per day is the minimum requirement for maintaining good health 6. However, the amount of water required by individuals varies depending on climate, standard of living, habit of the people and even age and sex.
One factor that impinges more on the accessibility to enough quality drinking water is the distance of the source from house. This condition forces the individual most especially the women and children (especially girls) to transverse many kilometers to get safe drinking water (which deprives them from engaging in productive ventures or going to school like their male counterparts). In addition to this, in order to reduce the hardship in getting water, they may resort to reducing the quantity of water used in the house far below the recommended volume and also they may resort to fetching water from unimproved sources e.g. unprotected well, pond, stream etc7.
Safe (quality) drinking water is that which does not present any significant health risk over a life time consumption, including any sensitivities that may occur in different stages of life.8 It is water which is free from pathogenic microbes, hazardous chemicals/substance and aesthetically acceptable ( i.e. pleasing to sight, odourless and good taste). It is important that this type of water should not only be available, but also be available in enough quantity all the time 4 i.e. twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week (“24/7”). In assessing quality of drinking water, physical, chemical and bacteriological parameters must be considered. Although water from a source may not pose any health threat to consumers, they may abhor it due to its colour, odour, or taste 8. Physical parameters include colour, smell, temperature, PH, turbidity etc. There are myriad of chemical substances which may be naturally present or introduced (even chemicals used for water treatment) into water; those that are naturally present seldom pose risk to health. However, chemicals released due to anthropogenic activities (fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, industrial effluents and byproducts etc) carry more health risk to consumers. Fortunately, whether chemical naturally present or introduced into water, there are maximum allowable concentration (limit) of most of them proposed by World Health Organization (WHO) which serves as guide. Some of the chemical substances include residual chlorine (RC), Iron (Fe), Fluoride (Fl), Nitrate/Nitrite, Lead (Pb), Mercury (Hg)8,9,10 etc.
Bacteriological (microbial) parameter is used to assess drinking water quality using the index /indicator concept as advocated by Waite (1991) 9. The infectious risks associated with drinking water are primarily those posed by faecal pollution and their control depends on being able to assess the risk from any water source and applying suitable treatment to eliminate the risk. Rather than trying to detect the presence of pathogens at which time the consumer is being exposed to possible infection, it is better practice to look for organisms, while not pathogenic themselves, that show the presence of faecal pollution and therefore the potential for the presence of pathogens. For this reason, Escherichia coli (E.coli) is universally used as an indicator organism to assess water treatment and widely preferred as index organism for faecal contamination.9 Thermotolerant coliform count (Faecal coliform) is acceptable where E.coli detection is not possible8,9.
The presence of other microbes may indicate faecal contamination as well e.g. faecal streptococci indicate recent contamination of water sources with faeces.9,10
While planet earth is made up of predominantly water, only 3% is fresh water, and of this, 99% is trapped in icecaps and glaciers. Even the 1% of the fresh water available for human use is not evenly distributed11.
According to WHO and UNICEF report (2006), safe water which is a basic necessity is still a luxury for many poor developing countries of the world today. It has been estimated that over 1.1 billion people do not have access to drinking water from improved sources. Eighty percent of the unserved populations live in these three regions – Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Asia and Southern Asia. Eighty- four percent of these people are the rural dwellers 7. In 2004, 83% of the world population (5.3 billion) had access to drinking water from improved sources. This seemingly high global statistics hide a critical situation in some developing countries. In sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania only 54% and 50% of their populations respectively are served with improved sources of drinking water in 2004. Whereas at the same period, the population that had access to water from improved sources is over 90% in the Caribbean, Northern Africa and Western Asia.
Although over 80% of the developing world population has access to some type of improved drinking water source, only 44% have access through household connection from piped system. There are large disparities between regions. While access to drinking water through household connection is as low as 16% in Sub-Saharan Africa, 20% in South-Eastern and 21% in Oceania; it is much higher in Eastern Asia 70%, Northern Africa 76%, and 80% in Latin America and the Caribbean 7.
There is also urban / rural disparity in access to drinking water. Access to drinking water from an improved source is significantly higher in urban than in rural areas. In rural areas, in virtually the entire developing world, drinking water coverage from an improved source remains unacceptably low. Urban drinking water coverage is 95% from 1990 to 2004, whereas in rural areas coverage increased to 73% in 2004 from 64% in 1990 7,12. In 27 developing countries (Nigeria inclusive), less than 50% of the rural population have access to improved drinking water 7.
The situation of access to improved water in Nigeria is not different from her counterparts in the sub-Saharan African region. In fact in some cases the situations may be worse. In 1990, 49% of Nigerian population have access to improved water but this figure dropped to 48% in 2004 7. According to WHO/UNICEF estimates that in 2006, 65% of Nigerian urban population have access to improved drinking water sources (a decline from 80% urban drinking water coverage in 1990)13 but only 7% of the population have their houses connected to tap borne water supply and at the same period, 30% of Nigerian rural population have access to improved drinking water sources and 2% of the rural households are connected to tap borne water supply 14.
Over 50% of the water supplies are intermittent and some of the sources of improved drinking water are seasonal i.e. some run out of water during the dry season 12.
Water treatment plants are poorly maintained, some have become obsolete and urgently need upgrading which seldom occur despite the population increase (due to increase in birth and rural-urban migration). Pipes laid to convey water to houses hardly get to their destination because they are shabbily done with substandard materials. Evidences of water being pumped from the water treatment plants to a community are broken pipes gushing out water all over the places and gutters but no water in houses.
Poor quality of drinking water is responsible for the spread of deadly diseases such as cholera, typhoid, dysentery, shigellosis, hepatitis A, poliomyelitis, Escherichia coli diarrhoea etc13. Every year unsafe water, coupled with poor basic sanitation, kills about 1.6 million children under 5years which is more than eight times the number of people who died as a result of Asian Tsunamis in 2004 7 and most of this occur in poor /economically disadvantaged countries of the world. According to WHO,
80% of ill- health in developing countries can be traced to lack of access to safe drinking water and poor sanitation. About 37% of all diarrhoeal cases in the world occur in the Sub-Saharan Africa 2. Four million under 5 children die annually in developing nations from diarrhoeal diseases which place a heavy burden on the health services. Although diarrhoea is less frequent in adult, it is also an important cause of mortality 3 most especially in the aged and immuno-compromised 15.
Mortality resulting from the consumption of contaminated food and water in Africa is around 700,000 annually. The incidence of diarrhoea caused by consumption of contaminated food and water was estimated at up to five episodes per child per year. The Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALY) lost to food and water borne diarrhoea in Africa region was 4.1 per 1000 globally as compared to 5.7-7.1 per 1000 in Africa by Dr. Daniel Kertesz, ( 2009, WHO Country Representative for Ghana). Diarrhoea diseases and worm infestations account for 10% of the total disease burden in developing / economically disadvantaged countries 4 .
In Nigeria, 315,000 under 5 children die annually due to diarrhoea which is 23 times more than under 14 years mortality in Europe caused by the same 13. Federal Ministry of Health’s (Nigeria) data rate diarrhoea second after malaria as a disease of high prevalence. It accounts for 16% of under 5 mortality 16. Worm infestation is still having its toll on the people especially the vulnerable (children and women).Schistosoma haematobium and mansoni are the causes of schistosomiasis with prevalence in communities that patronize ponds and other artificial reservoirs where snails breed. The incidence in different parts of the country ranges from 10-18% in Gumau, Bauchi State, 50.4% in Admin community, Cross River State to 71.8% in Oyan reservoir area, Ogun State 13. Generally, children and women are more prone to water borne and water related diseases; this could be because children (especially under 5 years) require twice the amount of water consumed by adults per day and women consume 20% more than men which means, children and women are 100% and 20% respectively more exposed than men 13.
Due to the recognition of the impact of water and sanitation, national and international strategies, goals etc have been developed and one of the recent declarations on the global front is the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This is the product of United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 2000. MDG 7, target number 10 is to “halve by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and sanitation” and the health indicator which will be used to monitor success of this target is indicator number 30 “proportion of population with sustainable access to an improved water sources, urban and rural ” 17 . In addition, the UN Millennium project task force on water and sanitation recently recognized that integrated development and management of water resources is crucial to the success or failure of all the MDGs as water is the centre to livelihood of all individuals 8
Outcomes of many international conferences and fora on health, water and sanitation led to co-operations and collaborations between international organizations and nations to provide improved sources of water, provision of technical assistance to governments, monitoring etc. For example there is a global WHO/UNEP network for air and water quality monitoring which is operational in more than 60 countries. Surface and groundwater quality are monitored in 350 cities worldwide.4
Despite the declining water coverage rate in Nigeria, various successive governments had made efforts both on the federal and state levels to increase access to improved drinking. In the 1960s Niger and Chad river Basins were commissioned to produce hydrological map of Nigeria’s water resources. Subsequently from 1973-1976 eleven river basin development authority were established to develop the country’s water resources to meet domestic need, agriculture etc. Creation of dams in various part of the nation for hydroelectric power generation, agriculture and domestic uses, establishment of Water Boards and Corporations at regional and state level for distribution of potable water to urban and semi-urban areas. To extend this service to rural communities, the government created Directorate of Food, Road, and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI), Agricultural Development Projects (ADPs) and co-opting of some non-governmental organizations such as UNICEF and recently World Bank to partner with government in developing Nigeria’s water resources. Establishment of Federal Ministry of Water Resources (FMWR), River Basin Development Authority (RBDA) in 1976, National Water Resources Institute (NWRI) in 1977 saddled with responsibilities in training, formulation of policies, monitoring etc13.
In the 1980s, government of Nigeria made concerted effort to attain the target of UN International Drinking water Supply and sanitation which was to provide potable water for all by the year 1990 4,13. Although Nigeria fell short of the target, it was able to provide 25 litres and 60 litres of potable to rural and urban dwellers respectively.
A national water supply and sanitation policy was adopted in January, 2000. The policy made adequate water supply and sanitation a right of all Nigerians and gives responsibility to all the three tiers of government, private sectors and the beneficiary13.