Water Purification Topic of Joint US-Russian Project
In the summer of 1993, a tapwater-borne disease outbreak in Milwaukee killed more than 100 people and sickened 400,000 others. The crisis could have been ripped from the pages of a germ-warfare thriller in which post-Cold War agents sabotage innocent-looking drinking water, but a bacterium named Cryptosporidium proved to be the culprit. The crisis marked a notable battle in germ warfare provoked not by saboteurs, but instead by tainted water. With this kind of germ warfare in mind, more than 20 Russian water supply officials from 10 cities reported to HSPH recently for basic training.
Phillippe
Daniel of Camp, Dresser & McKee Inc. in California addresses Russian
water utility managers and public health professionals.
Timothy Ford, associate professor of environmental microbiology, Andrey Egorov, SD candidate in the Department of Environmental Health, and Jennifer Adibi, US-Russia project coordinator in the department's environmental science and engineering program, organized the Russians' visit with the help of their Russian partner Vladislav Fourman. The week-long seminar included lectures and field trips to nearby water treatment facilities and represented one component of a four-year project between HSPH and the Russian Ministry of Health and State Committee on Environmental Protection in Environmental Health Management.
"Ideally, we want them to take information back to their respective water utilities and set-up workable treatment schemes," said Ford.
The HSPH seminar addressed the health effects of water pollution, advanced water monitoring, treatment techniques, information systems, and risk management.
"The questions are relevant and important for everybody," said Nina Drijd, director of a Russian environmental surveillance system. "We hope to take the ideas to Russia and implement them there."
Health officials have battled waterborne diseases for more than a century. In the early 1900s, US officials introduced filtration and then chlorine to water treatment methods. Disease rates dropped dramatically. Over time, researchers developed finer methods of filtration and other means to protect water sources.
But officials in both developed and developing countries should remain vigilant over drinking-water safety, warned Ford. The incidence of waterborne disease is increasing, he said, and pathogens can cause a plethora of unpleasant and sometimes deadly illnesses such as diarrhea and typhoid. The agents target the most vulnerable: the elderly, very young, and immunocompromised.
Timothy
Ford (center), associate professor of environmental microbiology, discusses
water quality management with Andrey Egorov (left), and Vladislav Fourman.
The pathogens thrive in aging and overtaxed water systems. Over time, layers of organic materials ranging from feces to dirt build up on the interiors of pipes. These layers, called biofilms, serve as hospitable homes to opportunistic pathogens that grow under the protective films. The biofilms buffer the agents against flushing and chlorination. Older pipes also tend to crack more easily than new ones, which allows contaminants to enter the water supply long after the water has left the treatment plant.
Russian officials protect their water sources using methods similar to Western strategies, but a crumbling economy exacerbates their work. "They have a fairly good water treatment system," said Ford, "but it is deteriorating." The lack of funding restricts room for improvements, he said. The results are growing rates of incidence of hepatitis A and cholera.
And the rates may be dramatically underreported. Ford cites a global problem of underreporting because the symptoms of waterborne-provoked illness can be vague or misdiagnosed easily.
Treatment of illness suffers from undetermined origins. People presenting vague symptoms may be prescribed antibiotics that are useless against viruses.
Not all of the technologies discussed at the HSPH seminar are applicable immediately to Russia, mainly due to costs. But that did not deter the Russian visitors from learning lessons to be implemented later.
