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Sanitary situation
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3.2.8 Sanitary situation
Pollution from untreated or inadequately treated sewage generated by large urban areas located in the catchments of the Dnipro River and its tributaries appears to be a major factor affecting the sanitary situation in the Basin. Urban runoff and storm water discharges are also considered to contribute significantly to the problems of surface water pollution. The overwhelming majority of human settlements have separate storm water drainage systems that are not connected to centralised wastewater treatment plants, resulting in urban/rainstorm runoff entering the river basin without any treatment.
The surface waters of the Dnipro Basin receive and accumulate a substantial organic pollution load as a result of human activities and a full assessment of the magnitude of this load has yet to be made. Organic pollution has a profound effect on water quality in terms of its physical, chemical, biological and sanitary-hygienic characteristics.
Water mains and related inspection wells are reported to be a source of water pollution in the Russian Federation, due to their generally poor technical state, frequent breakage’s and absence of disinfection practices. For example, 40% of water samples collected in recreational areas were found to have been non-compliant due to the presence of Helminth eggs. The provision of good quality drinking water to the population has become a serious issue. Over 50% of municipal and corporate water supplies do not meet sanitary standards, with one quarter of water samples from centralised water supply systems and one third of samples from municipal water mains being non-compliant with existing requirements.
The key areas suffering from poor water quality and sanitation in Belarus are the Svisloch River throughout its whole length from Minsk to Osipovichi; the Berezina River near Bobruisk and Svetlogorsk (downstream of its confluence with the Svisloch River); and the Pripyat River near Mosyr and Narovl. In the Dnipro River section near Rechitsa, pollution levels were reported to be significantly higher than acceptable limits for a range of parameters with between 52 and 71% of water quality samples found to be non-compliant. Pollution levels were found to be lower in the downstream section, and the proportion of non-compliant water quality samples taken near Loev ranged between 2 and 30% for various years. Figure 3.8 shows the mean annual proportions of non-compliant water quality samples and total annual percentages of water quality samples not meeting sanitary standards in the Belorussian part of the Dnipro River Basin between 1999-2001.
It is commonly recognised that gross exceedence (by a factor of 1,116 for bacteriophages, and 5,000 for Escherichia coli) of mandatory microbiological and sanitary requirements, is the clearest evidence of a continuous threat of waterborne contagious diseases in the region. This is exacerbated by the reported presence of Salmonella and Helminth species in treated wastewater discharged into the Svisloch River. Moreover, treated wastewater is reported to have relatively high mutagenicity levels (scores of 2 in 30% of samples, and 3 in 50% of samples).
Figure 3.8 Mean annual proportions of non-compliant water quality samples and total annual percentages of water quality samples not meeting sanitary standards in the Belorussian part of the Dnipro River Basin 1999-2001
Monitoring data for 2000, provided by the Ukrainian Sanitary/ Epidemiological Service suggests that a considerable proportion of surface water bodies and drinking water supplies contain water of an unacceptable quality. In 2000, 26.6% of surface water samples were found to be non-compliant with existing sanitary standards, and 15.5% of them did not meet microbiological requirements. Pollution levels detected in drinking water appear to be very high. For example, 20.4% of drinking water intakes did not meet either sanitary or chemical composition requirements, and 9.3% did not meet microbiological requirements.
The rural population appears to be at greatest risk of consuming drinking water of unacceptable quality, although even in the large industrial centres 11.1% of tap water samples were found to be non-compliant with sanitary and chemical composition requirements and 5.5% did not meet microbiological requirements.
Interestingly, the results of regular sanitary/bacteriological monitoring suggest that river water quality with respect to microbiological pollution has remained relatively stable over recent years.
