Water Quality and Hygiene Status of Rural Drinking Water in Anhui Province

Objective To understand the health status of drinking water in rural area of Anhui and provide evidences for improving the monitoring in rural drinking water quality. Methods More than 10 monitoring stations were set up in each county for distributed water supply,while no less than 10 percent of the establishment of monitoring stations was set up for centralized water supply. Each monitoring occurred both the high flow period and the low water period. Results Monitoring results of the overall passing rate of water quality from 1998 to 2006 showed that 47.24 percent of the samples got the second level and 64.40 percent of the samples got the third. The water quality in the two flow periods was relatively stable. Rural drinking water was groundwater-based,and distributed water supply-based. Conclusion Rural drinking water quality is relatively stable in the province but the low passing rate. Water pollution has the trend of further increase;potential safety hazard exists in rural drinking water.