DRINKING WATER QUALITY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR HUMAN HEALTH IN PUNJAB, PAKISTAN

Safe drinking water is a human birthright as much a birthright as clean air. However, much of the world's population does not have access to safe drinking water. As Water and Sanitation is the neglected sector in Pakistan so, most of the households in Pakistan do not have access to safe drinking water and lack toilets and adequate sanitation systems. \ud This study was aimed at determining the drinking water quality influencing factors and their health outcome. It was conducted in three districts; Rawalpindi, Multan, and Toba tek singh of Punjab province and a sample of 600 married females of age group 20-60 were interviewed keeping in view that in most cultures, women are primarily responsible for the use and management of water resources, sanitation and health at the household level. Additionally, focus group discussions (FGDs) were also conducted to explore detailed information. \ud Univariate analysis provides simple descriptive statistics (frequencies and percentages) on a large number of questions (indicators) asked in the survey. \ud The main findings at bi-variate analysis depicted a significant relationship between all drinking water influencing factors (i.e. household income, family type, female's education ,type of house, number of domestic water sources, nature of drinking water source, main storage system at home, separate water storage container for drinking and cooking purposes, use of measures to improve the drinking water quality, number and structure of toilet at home, and practice of washing hands after using toilet) and health outcome. Multi-variate analysis showed the most important and contributing factors, in explaining the health outcome of households, which were the source of drinking water, family type, separate drinking water container, household income, and mother's education. Multi-variate analysis results showed that the people having low family income had worse health outcomes than people having high family income. Additionally, mother's years of educations were found to be positively co-related with improved family health. The results showed that the increase in number of households having separate water storage container resulted in increase in households getting suffered because of the unhygienic way of water handling. \ud From the focus groups discussions, it was concluded that most of the participants were using two sources (WASA/Municipal, GW) for domestic water at home in addition to this there were other sources used by the participants including water filter plants, tube wells etc. for drinking purpose. Most of the participants were not satisfied with the taste of the water as they have groused of brackish taste of ground water. Only one fourth of the participants were using measures to improve the drinking water quality. Almost every participant had separate storage covered container for drinking and cooking purposes but without faucet as a result their way of handling was unhygienic in view of the fact they dip utensil into the container for usage. Majority of the households were using single toilet. More than half of the participants were used to wash their hands every time after using toilet but in rural areas some of the participants did not take into account hand washing practice regularly as they did not put the soap in their toilet. \ud Keeping in view the above findings it is recommended that Govt. should work on emergent basis in the battle of drinking water shortage and NGO'S should come forward alongwith the govt. in order to make the people aware of adopting measures before drinking water usage to improve its quality. Policy measures aimed at managing anaemia should seek to address all these factors