Enhancing arsenic mitigation in Bangladesh: Findings from institutional, psychological, and technical investigations

Reduction in exposure to arsenic from drinking well-water in Bangladesh limited by insufficient testing and awareness

“…An additional benefit of testing wells is that, lacking a deep community well, households in many villages currently using an unsafe well have the option of walking to tested, safe neighboring wells to collect water (van Geen et al, 2002; George et al, 2012). These nearby switching options have little or no financial cost but can be hampered by social barriers (Johnston et al, 2014). The cost of blanket testing approximately 10 million wells in the affected portions of the country would be on the order of U$20 million if a durable placard with the test result is provided (van Geen et al 2014).…”

Inequitable allocation of deep community wells for reducing arsenic exposure in Bangladesh

“…Deep tubewells defined as >150 m deep by the government’s Department of Public Health Engineering (DPHE) have become the mainstay of efforts to reduce exposure by providing public water points that are low in As (Johnston et al, 2014; Ravenscroft et al, 2014). One reason is that deep tubewells can supply drinking water that generally is of acceptable chemical and microbial quality for many years (van Geen et al, 2003; Howard et al, 2006; van Geen et al, 2007; DPHE/JICA, 2009; McArthur et al, 2010).…”

“…A single deep tubewell located in a widely accessible public location can meet the needs of several hundred villagers (van Geen et al, 2003). Another reason for the popularity of deep wells is that although their cost of ~$850 (Ravenscroft et al, 2014) is beyond the reach of most individual households in Bangladesh, they require little maintenance compared to the pond-sand filters and hand-dug wells that were initially given precedence in As-affected areas under the government’s arsenic-mitigation policy (Johnston et al, 2014). These factors help explain why a growing share of government and donor funding has been used to install deep wells, almost 200,000 as of 2007 and many more since (DPHE/JICA, 2009; Ravenscroft et al, 2014).…”

“…The installation of several hundred thousand deep wells throughout the country is a positive development but has not fully addressed the still serious public-health issue of As exposure (Flanagan et al, 2012; Johnston et al, 2014). At the regional scale, one reason is that over half the deep wells have been installed in areas where the proportion of shallow high-As wells is modest and low-As water can often be accessed by sharing existing wells (DPHE/JICA, 2009).…”

“…Another reason for concern is that the proportion of untested shallow private wells in Bangladesh has grown significantly and households therefore often don’t realize that their well is high in As (Ahmed et al, 2006; WASH, 2008; DPHE/JICA, 2009; George et al, 2012). Finally, even when households know that their well is high in As and a deep well is within walking distance, the perceived health benefits are not always sufficient to motivate fetching water from it several times a day because of social and other factors (Chen et al, 2007; Madajewicz et al, 2007; Mosler et al, 2010; Inauen et al, 2013; Johnston et al, 2014; van Geen et al, 2014). …”