Third of councils not testing water

More than one third of county and city councils have not tested public water supplies for a potentially fatal disease, it emerged today.

There were three outbreaks of cryptosporidiosis last year, which were suspected to be water borne.

The 2004 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) water quality report found that just 59% of the 34 county and city councils tasked with inspecting public water supplies had carried out a risk assessment for cryptosporidiosis.

The parasitic disease, which causes fever and diarrhoea, is potentially fatal to the very young, the very old and those with severely weakened immune systems. It can be passed into water supplies through infected human or animal faeces.

The EPA found that 363 risk assessments were carried out on public water supplies and 21% were found to be in the high-risk or very high-risk categories.

Under new drinking water regulations, county councils are required to take regular samples for quality testing.

But the EPA has no power to take action against a county council that is not providing safe drinking-water supplies and it called for legislation to rectify this.

The water quality study examined the results of around 190,000 tests of drinking water in 904 public water supplies, 794 public group water schemes, 778 private group water schemes and 123 small private supplies.

It found that the overall quality of drinking water supplied by the local authorities to 84% of the population was satisfactory.

But Dr Matthew Crowe, the programme manager at the EPA's Office of Environmental Enforcement, said the quality of drinking water supplied by private group water schemes to less than 7% of the population remained unsatisfactory.

“The poor microbiological quality of the private group water schemes is the most challenging issue facing the authorities charged with responsibility for drinking water in Ireland,” he said.

“Sanitary authorities should concentrate their enforcement efforts on private group schemes that consistently breach the drinking water standards to bring about the necessary improvements in drinking water quality.”

However, the rate of compliance in private water schemes for E.coli, a germ that causes severe cramps and diarrhoea, had improved from 74.9% in 2003 to 78.1% last year.

10:18:15 - Third of councils not testing water for disease

Get your Ringtones, Java Games & Colour Logos from IOL 's My Mobile site

This is cache, read story here