What is it about ?
The tap water you drink, the water you use for your coffee or tea, the water you brush your teeth with or rinse food with is potable water. When this water is contaminated (for example by intestinal bacteria E. Coli), a large number of people can get sick (epidemic). This situation is often due to a lack of wastewater treatment or poor water purification, or to contamination of drinking water by intestinal bacteria from humans and / or animals.
In northern Europe, Norovirus and the bacteria Campylobacter jejuni often cause epidemics due to contaminated drinking water.
Drinking water legislation requires water companies to regularly monitor the quality of running water. In addition, independent laboratories also carry out controls on the orders of municipalities, provinces and regions. Drinking water is indisputably the food subject to the strictest controls.
What is their frequency?
Tap water meets the strictest health and quality standards. When water companies notice a problem that can affect health, they are obliged to report it to the public authorities in charge of the environment and health.
Epidemics are more common in areas where groundwater is used for drinking water, because unlike surface water, it usually does not need to be purified.
How is the diagnosis made?
When a large number of people in a demarcated geographic area have a gastrointestinal infection, the doctor will think about the possibility of an outbreak due to contaminated drinking water.
To confirm this hypothesis and rule out other possible causes, water will be taken for analysis and the stools of people with symptoms will be examined. We determine the extent of the epidemic region, and we carefully check what may be causing the epidemic. Drinking water supply companies, sewerage services and the construction sector are asked whether the water treatment plant is still functioning properly and whether there is any damage to water stations or facilities. sewer lines or if work is in progress.
What can you do and what can your doctor do?
In the event of an epidemic, the authorities concerned will inform you of what to do, such as boiling drinking water (at least 5 minutes) or no longer using running water until the mains water supply is again clean and operational.
If you got infected anyway, keep drinking enough so that you don’t get dehydrated. In some situations it may be appropriate to start treatment with medicines (eg antibiotics).
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