Effective and culturally acceptable water storage in Zimbabwe: maintaining the quality of water abstracted from upgraded family wells.

Because domestic water can be a vehicle of disease transmission in the home, there is a need for intervention. In Zimbabwe. 60 rural households obtaining water from shallow wells were selected for a field study. A water urn was designed, pretested, and field-tested. Thirty households designated as the case group were given two water urns each to substitute for traditional water storage containers (paint containers, oil containers, etc.). The remaining 30 households served as a control group. Samples were collected twice, at two-week intervals, from the water supply source (upgraded family wells) and storage containers (water urn or traditional containers) of each household (228 samples). Total coliform bacteria and fecal coliform bacteria were enumerated with the membrane filtration technique. A pretest of the water urn design showed a decline in turbidity that corresponded with a decline in bacterial counts. Wells supplying the case households had higher bacterial counts than those supplying the control households, but bacterial loads in the water urns were significantly lower than those observed in the corresponding supply wells (paired t-test: t = 3.97, df = 55, p < .01). Bacterial loads in traditional containers were similar to those observed in the supply wells (paired t-test; t = 0.2, df = 57, p > .05). The case group eagerly substituted water urns for traditional containers. The use of water urns was found to prevent or to reduce further contamination of well water after collection.

Pit latrine effluent infiltration into groundwater: the Epworth case study.

Water can be a vehicle for the transmission of communicable diseases. Technologies have been developed to protect groundwater from external surface contamination. However, there is growing concern about the likelihood of pit latrine effluent infiltrating into groundwater reservoirs for well water supply systems. Investigations on seasonal variations and extent of pit latrine effluent infiltration into soil and groundwater have been carried out in Zimbabwe. Preliminary results show that groundwater flows in the direction of surface runoff, and that there is no lateral soil pollution above the groundwater surface. Pit latrine contents leach downwards and down slopes for distances that vary per season and soil type. The results also demonstrate the contribution of refuse pits and water collection methods to groundwater pollution.