U.S. drinking water challenges in the twenty-first century.

Abstract

The access of almost all 270 million U.S. residents to reliable, safe drinking water distinguishes the United States in the twentieth century from that of the nineteenth century. The United States is a relatively water-abundant country with moderate population growth; nonetheless, current trends are sufficient to strain water resources over time, especially on a regional basis. We have examined the areas of public water infrastructure, global climate effects, waterborne disease (including emerging and resurging pathogens), land use, groundwater, surface water, and the U.S. regulatory history and its horizon. These issues are integrally interrelated and cross all levels of public and private jurisdictions. We conclude that U.S. public drinking water supplies will face challenges in these areas in the next century and that solutions to at least some of them will require institutional changes.

Water Safety and Lead Regulation: Physicians' Community Health Responsibilities

“…The cost of lead remediation for the entire country is estimated at $1.3 trillion [29]. These are the costs of fixing pipes; the cost of providing medical care for those who have already been-or will be-affected by lead exposure if better protective measures are not taken has yet to be calculated [1,2,12].…”

“…In 1991, the EPA estimated that between 14 and 20 percent of total lead exposure was from drinking water [11]. Further changes to the SDWA in 1992 and 1996 strengthened protections of drinking water, but the LCR action level has remained unchanged [12].…”

“…Many households are not subject to regulation because they draw untreated water from private wells that are not regulated by the EPA. The responsibility for ensuring that public drinking water systems actually meet the SDWA standards is divided among the EPA, state governments, tribal governments, and private water systems acting as public utilities [12,22]. This regulatory system is based upon regular monitoring and reporting by local officials.…”

“…This regulatory system is based upon regular monitoring and reporting by local officials. In 1986, amendments to the SWDA required that new or revised drinking water standards be developed for 83 specific contaminants and called for the addition of contaminant standards thereafter [12]. Water sampling frequency requirements vary for each contaminant group.…”

Immuno- and Hepato-Toxicity of Dichloroacetic Acid in MRL+/+and B6C3F1Mice

“…An estimated 150 million people in the United States ingest 2 L/day of chlorinated drinking water (Christman et al, 1983) derived from surface or ground water containing DCA (Krasner et al, 1989). Therefore, a sizable population is continuously exposed to DCA (Kim et al, 1999;Levin et al, 2002). A concentration range of 0.38-160 μg/L of DCA has been reported in U.S. drinking water supplies (Uden and Miller, 1983;Chen and Weisel, 1998;Kim et al, 1999).…”