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Water sharing offers insight into the everyday and, at times, invisible ties that bind people and households with water and to one another. Water sharing can take many forms, including so-called “pure gifts,” balanced exchanges, and negative reciprocity. In this paper, we examine water sharing between households as a culturally-embedded practice that may be both need-based and symbolically meaningful. Drawing on a wide-ranging review of diverse literatures, we describe how households practice water sharing cross-culturally in the context of four livelihood strategies (hunter-gatherer, pastoralist, agricultural, and urban). We then explore how cross-cutting material conditions (risks and costs/benefits, infrastructure and technologies), socio-economic processes (social and political power, water entitlements, ethnicity and gender, territorial sovereignty), and cultural norms (moral economies of water, water ontologies, and religious beliefs) shape water sharing practices. Finally, we identify five new directions for future research on water sharing: conceptualization of water sharing; exploitation and status accumulation through water sharing, biocultural approaches to the health risks and benefits of water sharing, cultural meanings and socio-economic values of waters shared; and water sharing as a way to enact resistance and build alternative economies.

While most US adults consumed plain water, the source (i.e. tap or bottled) and amount differed by race/Hispanic origin, nativity status and education. Water filters may increase tap water consumption.

Zika virus is a flavivirus transmitted primarily by Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus mosquitoes, and infection can be asymptomatic or result in an acute febrile illness with rash (1). Zika virus infection during pregnancy is a cause of microcephaly and other severe birth defects (2). Infection has also been associated with Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) (3) and severe thrombocytopenia (4,5). In December 2015, the Puerto Rico Department of Health (PRDH) reported the first locally acquired case of Zika virus infection. This report provides an update to the epidemiology of and public health response to ongoing Zika virus transmission in Puerto Rico (6,7). A confirmed case of Zika virus infection is defined as a positive result for Zika virus testing by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for Zika virus in a blood or urine specimen. A presumptive case is defined as a positive result by Zika virus immunoglobulin M (IgM) enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (MAC-ELISA)* and a negative result by dengue virus IgM ELISA, or a positive test result by Zika IgM MAC-ELISA in a pregnant woman. An unspecified flavivirus case is defined as positive or equivocal results for both Zika and dengue virus by IgM ELISA. During November 1, 2015-July 7, 2016, a total of 23,487 persons were evaluated by PRDH and CDC Dengue Branch for Zika virus infection, including asymptomatic pregnant women and persons with signs or symptoms consistent with Zika virus disease or suspected GBS; 5,582 (24%) confirmed and presumptive Zika virus cases were identified. Persons with Zika virus infection were residents of 77 (99%) of Puerto Rico's 78 municipalities. During 2016, the percentage of positive Zika virus infection cases among symptomatic males and nonpregnant females who were tested increased from 14% in February to 64% in June. Among 9,343 pregnant women tested, 672 had confirmed or presumptive Zika virus infection, including 441 (66%) symptomatic women and 231 (34%) asymptomatic women. One patient died after developing severe thrombocytopenia (4). Evidence of Zika virus infection or recent unspecified flavivirus infection was detected in 21 patients with confirmed GBS. The widespread outbreak and accelerating increase in the number of cases in Puerto Rico warrants intensified vector control and personal protective behaviors to prevent new infections, particularly among pregnant women.

Objective: Water is an essential nutrient overlooked in many cross-cultural studies of human nutrition. The present article describes dietary water intake patterns among forager-horticulturalist adults in lowland Bolivia, compares daily intake with international references and examines if variation in how people acquire water relates to gastrointestinal illness. Design: Cross-sectional observational study used survey, anthropometric and qualitative methods with Tsimane' adults selected by age and sex stratification sampling in one community. Setting: Research occurred in one Tsimane' village in the Beni department, Bolivia with limited access to clean water. The 24 h diet and health recalls were conducted in July-August 2012 and qualitative interviews/ethnographic observation in September-October 2013. Subjects: Forty-five Tsimane' household heads (49 % men) took part in the first data collection and twenty-two Tsimane' (55 % men) were included in the followup interviews. Results: Men and women reported consuming 4·9 litres and 4·4 litres of water daily from all dietary sources, respectively. On average, water from foods represented 50 % of total water intake. Thirteen per cent of participants reported symptoms of gastrointestinal illness. In a logistic regression model adjusted for age, BMI, sex and raw water consumed, each percentage increase in water obtained from foods was associated with a reduced risk of gastrointestinal illness (OR = 0·92; 95 % CI 0·85, 0·99). Conclusions: Both total water intake and percentage of water from foods were higher than averages in industrialized countries. These findings suggest that people without access to clean water may rely on water-rich foods as a dietary adaptation to reduce pathogen exposures. Keywords Hydration strategiesWater intake Gastrointestinal illness Tsimane' AmazoniaAccess to improved water sources, such as hand-pumps or other technology designed to protect against fecal contamination, continues to be a critical public health problem among rural indigenous populations in lowincome countries (1) . To complement this need, the present study examines how individuals use local environmental resources to acquire water and the resulting health consequences (2) . Dietary flexibility serves as an adaptation to environmental constraints and relates to variation in nutrition, health and disease patterns (3,4) . Human populations have long used behaviours and food processing techniques as culturally integrated buffers that reduce toxicity and increase the digestibility and nutrients of food, such as the 10 d processing of bitter manioc (5) , corn alkali processing to reduce niacin deficiency (6) and fire and cooking (7) . Likewise, researchers hypothesize that people have historically used dietary strategies to flexibly meet their water needs, such as eating fruits when water is unavailable or using beer, gruel or cider fermentation to render dirty water drinkable and potentially medicinal (8,9) . In the present paper we describe hydration strategies, or a perso...

Total cholesterol (TC) levels, triglyceride levels, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) levels are linked to coronary heart disease. 1

This brief communication contains a description of the 2002-2010 annual panel collected by the Tsimane’ Amazonian Panel Study team. The study took place among the Tsimane’, a native Amazonian society of forager-horticulturalists. The team tracked a wide range of socio-economic and anthropometric variables from all residents (633 adults ≥16 years; 820 children) in 13 villages along the Maniqui River, department of Beni. The panel is ideally suited to examine how market exposure and modernization affect the well-being of a highly autarkic population and to examine human growth in a non-Western rural setting.