Kelly, E, Cronk, R, Fisher, M et al. (1 more author) (2021) Sanitary inspection, microbial water quality analysis, and water safety in handpumps in rural sub-Saharan Africa. npj Clean Water, 4 (3). ARTN 3. ISSN 2059-7037
Abstract
In sub-Saharan Africa, over half of the population is exposed to contaminated drinking water. The WHO recommends both sanitary inspection and water quality analysis to assess the risk of water source contamination, but the relationship between these tools is poorly understood. We explore the relationship between sanitary inspection and water quality analysis using data from 1028 boreholes with handpumps in 12 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Sanitary inspection scores and E. coli occurrence were compared using the models described in published literature, and an alternative model that better reflects causal pathways of contamination. In the alternative model, sanitary risk factors were categorized as contamination sources, carriers, or barrier breakdowns, and the relationships between risk factor combinations and E. coli occurrence were assessed. We found no associations between sanitary risk score and E. coli occurrence using either the established or alternative model. These results confirm that sanitary inspections and microbial analyses convey distinct information, and perfect correlation is neither expected nor desired. The alternative model demonstrated a slightly better model fit than most established models, and the model fit further improved when the occurrence of rainfall in the past two days was added as a carrier. We recommend that: implementers train water system operators to conduct sanitary inspection; and researchers work to improve our understanding of the effect of individual sanitary risk factors, as well as incorporate contextual data into their assessments of sanitary inspection and water quality.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2021. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Civil Engineering (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 26 Apr 2021 13:46 |
Last Modified: | 26 Apr 2021 13:46 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Nature Research |
Identification Number: | 10.1038/s41545-020-00093-z |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:173363 |