Suspected water contamination kills 10 Cambodians; 120 ill | The Sacramento Bee

Ten Cambodian villagers have died and 120 others have been sickened after drinking water suspected to be contaminated with insecticide, a health official said Sunday.
The dead and sickened villagers exhibited the same symptoms including breathing problems, dizziness, vomiting and chest pains, said the head of the Kratie Provincial Health Department, Chhneang Sivutha.
He said villagers began getting sick on Thursday.
Health authorities have collected water and food samples from the two villages and are awaiting laboratory results.
The deputy provincial police chief, Chhim Sokhim, suspected rainwater from nearby farms that use insecticide had come into contact with a stream where villagers collect water used for drinking and cooking.
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Outbreaks of food and water poisoning are not uncommon in Cambodia, where health checks are rare and safety regulations lax.

Meriden officials speak out on contaminated water issues

MERIDEN — Many residents living in Meriden are upset over a notice they received in the mail about their water being contaminated for months with the city knowing, however.
they weren’t told until this week.
“I’m scared I don’t want to drink the water, I don’t want to cook with the water.
I boiled bottled waters last night to make my son macaroni and cheese for dinner cause I’m just so afraid,” said Ashley Pires who lives in Meriden on one of the streets that had contaminated water.
Robert Peter who’s the superintendent of operations of water and wastewater said he found out drinking water in Meriden was contaminated in November, but the levels rose to a tier 2 around January 1st.
Now at the end of the second quarter is when residents are being notified now that levels are below maximum contamination.
He said he didn’t notify residents after the first quarter because he was following guidelines from the department of public health which has a contamination scale of one to three.
One being the most dangerous, fell at tier 2, which is a chronic pollutant health effect meaning it would take a long time of consumption to have a health effect.
“I’m not gonna believe them I’m gonna continue drinking the bottled water,” Pires said.
“The city definitely let us down they’re still letting us down, they’re not going to give us any money off of our water they’re not gonna give us free water.”

Fluoride contamination in water is forcing adivasis to flee this Telangana village

Those who cannot afford to migrate are grappling with ill-effects such as yellowing teeth, brittle bones, deformity and weakness.
Most of the people in the tiny village, which has 30 houses and a population of around 100, suffer from deformity and several others are at risk of being afflicted by the same – courtesy: fluoride contamination in drinking water.
The remaining villagers who could not afford to migrate took up the task of identifying the cause of the deaths by themselves.
Although the villagers do not use water from the handpump for drinking, they continue to use it for other purposes like washing rice, water for cattle, bathing and so on.
The village has only three handpumps that form the source of drinking water.
Not just in Devanagar, but in many hamlets and Adivasi villages, handpumps are the only source of water.
The tiny house, indistinguishable from the rest of the houses, belongs to septuagenarian Ankavva.
Her entire family – 17 of them – suffer from illness caused by fluoride contamination, except for her two daughters who are married and reside in a different village.
So whenever the pain becomes acute, Rajanna ‘self-medicates’ by burning the area.
With no money left to continue treatment, Ravi has surrendered himself to Christianity, hoping to find a cure through a miracle.

Meriden residents fired up over months-late notice on contaminated water

It notified them saying their water that was once contaminated has now been resolved.
However, the issue is that they were never notified the water was not safe to begin with.
That is the question that is being asked all over Meriden after the water department sent out the notice.
On the top, it lists April 24th as the date the notice was written.
On the back of the notice, it said the water was contaminated from January to March.
“We need to be notified of something that’s happening so that we can protect ourselves and our family from it,” added Caponera.
“I saw the word cancer and immediately thought of my children, thought about my future, thought about everything in general,” said Meriden Resident Sean McDonald.
The notice went on to explain the level of haloacetic acids exceeded the city’s water standards.
It then said the exposure to these acids long-term can lead to cancer.
When we asked why residents did not find out about the contamination until Tuesday, a response was not returned.

Maharashtra: More than 30 districts facing water contamination, says report

Mumbai: Water samples collected from over 30 districts of Maharashtra were found to have contaminants, a report by the state’s Public Health Laboratory has stated.
The Maharashtra Public Health Laboratory has found that water taken from various sources like bore wells, wells, public tanks and water tankers in rural and urban areas of several districts had traces of contamination.
It informed that the samples, taken from 34 out of the state’s 36 districts, excluding the two districts that make up Mumbai, were tested in several of its labs in March this year.
The report said that the problem was most severe in Washim district as 27 sted turned out to be contaminated.
Hingoli, at 24 per cent, and Chandrapur, with 21 per cent contaminated water samples, stood second and third respectively, the report stated.
It said that 20 per cent of water samples from districts like Aurangabad, Nanded and Raigad had contaminants while it was 15 per cent in Akola, Buldana, Yavatmal, Jalna, Gondia, Palghar and Sindhudurg districts.
The report added that districts such as Nagpur, Bhandara, Thane, Solapur, Satara, Osmanabad, Parbhani, Amravati and Latur have reported contamination in 10 per cent of the samples.
The districts which saw just five per cent contaminated water samples were Ratnagiri, Kolhapur, Sangli, Nandurbar, Wardha, Gadchiroli, Dhule and Jalgaon, it said.
“The districts with very high percentage of contaminated water samples need to be worried because using such water for potable purposes can lead to illnesses.
People need to be made aware to use clean water,” said Dr Suhas Bakare, deputy director, health services, State Health Laboratory.

More than 30 districts in Maharashtra facing water contamination: Report

Water samples collected from over 30 districts of Maharashtra were found to have contaminants, a report by the state’s Public Health Laboratory has stated.
The Maharashtra Public Health Laboratory has found that water taken from various sources like bore wells, wells, public tanks and water tankers in rural and urban areas of several districts had traces of contamination.
It informed that the samples, taken from 34 out of the state’s 36 districts, excluding the two districts that make up Mumbai, were tested in several of its labs in March this year.
The report said that the problem was most severe in Washim district as 27 per cent of the samples tested turned out to be contaminated.
Hingoli, at 24 per cent, and Chandrapur, with 21 per cent contaminated water samples, stood second and third respectively, the report stated.
It said that 20 per cent of water samples from districts like Aurangabad, Nanded and Raigad had contaminants while it was 15 per cent in Akola, Buldana, Yavatmal, Jalna, Gondia, Palghar and Sindhudurg districts.
The report added that districts such as Nagpur, Bhandara, Thane, Solapur, Satara, Osmanabad, Parbhani, Amravati and Latur have reported contamination in 10 per cent of the samples.
The districts which saw just five per cent contaminated water samples were Ratnagiri, Kolhapur, Sangli, Nandurbar, Wardha, Gadchiroli, Dhule and Jalgaon, it said.
"The districts with very high percentage of contaminated water samples need to be worried because using such water for potable purposes can lead to illnesses.
People need to be made aware to use clean water," said Dr Suhas Bakare, deputy director, health services, State Health Laboratory.

Warminster water authority lawyers up, eyes water contamination lawsuit

The Warminster Municipal Authority board voted Friday to hire law firm Anapol Weiss to consider suing firefighting foam manufacturers.
Board members of the Warminster Municipal Authority voted unanimously Friday afternoon to pay a legal firm to assess whether the authority could file a lawsuit to recoup its expenses over recent water contamination.
Anapol Weiss represents clients in those suits.
The Warminster Municipal Authority, which serves about 40,000 people, has been severely impacted by water contamination.
In all, six of the authority’s 18 wells were found to contain the chemicals above the EPA safety limit.
The military originally agreed to pay for the two others as well, but reneged after retesting about two years later found chemical levels had fallen back below the EPA recommended safety limit, Nemeroff said.
The well closures forced Warminster to purchase vast quantities of water from the North Wales Water Authority, which it currently uses for about 95 percent of its supply.
The military is not paying for those expenditures, as it abides by the EPA’s 70 ppt standard.
“The Navy and the Air Force have decided they are not going to cover the costs of treatment systems for other-contaminant related expenses for those wells that do not exceed the health advisory limits,” Nemeroff said.
At the meeting, the four-member board voted first to authorize Nemeroff to engage with Anapol Weiss and receive a fee structure for the firm’s work.

Camp Lejeune vets still struggling with water contamination

“I have no strength to grab anything.” The fall was one of dozens that Walker has sustained in recent months, events tied to conditions several doctors have told him are being caused by multiple sclerosis.
About 900,000 people lived at Camp Lejeune between 1953 and 1987, the years during which the base’s water was contaminated.
After a decades-long struggle, in March 2017, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) began presuming that veterans with one of eight conditions were ill because of their exposure on the base, no further proof necessary.
Key to the rules was creating a presumptive link between eight conditions and the Camp Lejeune contamination.
Since March 2017, the VA has granted 4,568 veterans a service connection for a presumptive condition, while another 876 veterans were ruled eligible for a condition not among the eight conditions.
Walker recalled saying, “You’ve got to understand: There’s a lot going on with Congress, and I’m not sure you’ll get to that stuff by the time I’m gone.” Among Burr’s recent efforts is the Janey Ensminger Act of 2017, a bill introduced last year that would require the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry to review the diseases linked to Lejeune contamination every three years.
“Camp Lejeune is the only toxic exposure incident or issue that the VA deals with that has a subject matter expert program for all the claims that are not covered by the presumptive,” Ensminger said.
After falling shortly before Easter, Walker was admitted to the hospital.
He could not, they told him, go to the bathroom without assistance from two of them.
Once the group reached the bathroom, a nurse offered to help Walker undo his pants.

Minnesota moves to regulate farm fertilizer to prevent water contamination

Farmers in Minnesota are using 10 to 15 percent more fertilizer than they need to maximize crop yields, one reason why drinking water across the state is increasingly contaminated with nitrogen, state agricultural officials say.
That is the incentive behind the state’s inaugural proposal to regulate farmers’ use of fertilizer, Minnesota Department of Agriculture officials said Tuesday as they made public the final version of a proposed regulation that has become a sore point between Governor Mark Dayton and Republican legislators.
Meanwhile, Dayton’s administration is moving forward with its proposed regulation, which has been years in the making.
But Hettver acknowledged that groundwater contamination "is a legitimate concern, and we need to be part of the solution."
It’s a modest step, but it sets up a good framework.” Environmental groups said that while the measure doesn’t go nearly far enough to fulfill the state’s responsibility to protect all groundwater, and not just drinking water, it is a start.
They also said the latest version now includes language that gives the agricultural commissioner greater latitude in forcing solutions to protecting water.
"It’s a modest step, but it sets up a good framework."
The state agriculture department considered, and then at the urging of farm interests rejected, a plan that would also cover private homeowners’ wells in rural townships.
Instead, the agricultural department will continue to support well testing and voluntary efforts by farmers to protect homeowners with private wells.
"A lot of our concerns have been addressed," said Thom Petersen of the Minnesota Farmers Union.

Boiled water notice issued for Putāruru after E coli found in water

It’s possible Putāruru residents have been drinking E coli contaminated water for days.
The sample was taken the day before from the Pinedale No 1 reservoir, which is supplied from Blue Springs.
The medical centre, rest homes and other key community groups were also informed on Friday and council began distributing pamphlets to properties, Anderson said.
Resident Michelle Hill didn’t receive a pamphlet until 3.30pm on Monday and although she found out about the contaminated water through social media on Friday, she was concerned for residents who weren’t as tech savvy.
"I spoke to four people on Monday who still didn’t know about the boiled water notice – that’s four full days."
We had a focus on social media and in hindsight we’ve had a look and recognise the importance of the mail drop," Andersen said.
"People think we’ve known since last Monday, but we take samples every four days.
Coca‑Cola, Aquasplash and New Zealand Quality Waters have all been made aware of the contamination, Andersen said.
Council believes the contamination has been caused by an animal, which has got into the reservoir, Andersen said.
Council is already proposing in its Long Term Plan to chlorinate water from Blue Springs from the beginning of the next financial year, Andersen said.