Water contamination results in several health conditions that strike us after prolonged use. The water inside your tap might not be clean enough to prevent these conditions. Here are six health concerns associated with contaminated drinking water that you ought to be wary of.
Drinking water can become contaminated with all sorts of things. Any chemical that we use in our daily lives will eventually work its way into the water table. In fact, even the chemicals we use to clean the water result in harmful by-products, which we cannot drink. If we do, we run the risk of developing diseases. Some of these include the following.
The 6 Long-Term Health Conditions that Contaminated Drinking Water Produces
There are too many health conditions that contaminated drinking water causes to list them all here, but we have selected six of the commonest.
1 – Parkinson’s Disease
One of the biggest sources of evidence linking Parkinson’s Disease with a contaminated water supply is that of Camp LeJeune. The Marine Corps Base Camp had seepage from by-products of water chlorination and the run from industrial chemicals in their water supply. As a result, residents developed cancers of the kidneys, livers, bladders, and other diseases. The primary other disease was Parkinson’s Disease. Click here to learn more about the connection between water contamination and Parkinson’s Disease.
2 – Bladder Cancer
There are traces of chlorination chemicals in the drinking water that comes out of your tap. Throughout the entire planet, these drinking water cleaning chemicals result in cases of bladder cancer. Over in Europe, 99% of all water treatment takes place using a harmful toxin called hypochlorite. This study examined other studies to determine that anything above 20 µg/L of hypochlorite could cause bladder cancers.
3 – Diarrhea
Although you associate this condition with a short-term sickness, for millions of people in water-stressed countries, diarrhea can be a long-term complaint. Unfortunately, this condition can only go on for so long before it proves fatal. Every year, the world loses 485,000 people to death via diarrheal diseases. Cholera and Dysentery, to name two. These diseases result from contaminated drinking water, particularly in countries where 2 billion people drink water contaminated with fecal matter.
4 – Hepatitis A
Although Hep A tends to clear up on its own, there are still no known treatments for this disease. Hepatitis A is a disease occurring when sewerage water touches fresh water. When this contamination occurs, the human liver struggles to cope. The immune system goes into overdrive trying to expel the nasty water. You develop Hep A, a condition which takes about 6 months to rid yourself of. It can cause liver damage, or it can pass on its own.
5 – Typhoid Fever
There are numerous studies connecting typhoid fever outbreaks to contaminated drinking water. There is this one, which details a persistent outbreak in Kampala, or this one, which found a remote community suffering three deaths. There are pages and pages of likewise reports. Typhoid fever can have permanent neuropsychiatric complications and can cause death.
6 – Leukemia
Not just leukemia, either. Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, liver cancer, kidney cancer, and others can all come from bad water. Drinking in it or bathing in it can give you cancer. Again, there are numerous studies that back this up.
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