Look out! You are drinking poison

DEEPAK ACHARJEE
Nearly 10 lakh people out of a total population of one crore, in Dhaka city have been suffering from various life-threatening diseases. including cancer, by taking for a long time water supplied by the Dhaka Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA). A large number of them, who have been already afflicted with various diseases, are gradually heading towards death.
As chlorine, which is very harmful for human consumption, is used for the treatment of the highly polluted water of the river
Shitalakkha, most of the city people who consume water supplied by Dhaka WASA are suffering from colon cancer, gastric ulcer, kidney, liver, lung, heart, brain and nervous. diseases, according to doctors of Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Sir Salimullah Medical College Hospital and the National Institute of Cardiac Vascular Disease (NICVD).
Residents of the old city, Dhanmondi, Moghbazar, Malibagh, Khilgaon, Green Road, Plassy, Tejgaon and Farm Gate localities are consuming water supplied from the Syedabad
Water Treatment Plant-1 (SWTP) of Dhaka WASA and they have been suffering from many complicated diseases, according to competent sources.
Though Dhaka WASA is aware of the fact, it is less bothered about informing the authorities concerned and is not taking any remedial action. Rather, it has taken the initiative to install another treatment plant (phase- II) at Syedabad soon to supply water to the city dwellers as a top priority project.
As the same chemical will be used for purification of water in the second plant at Syedabad, 10
lakh more people totalling 20 lakh people will be pushed to the brisk of death.
Abul Hasnat, superintending engineer of the Syedabad Water Treatment Circle of Dhaka WASA, told The Independent that the water of the river Shitalakkh was treated with liquid chlorine gas, alum sulphate and cold lime by the SWTP process.
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As the water of Shitalakkha more polluted in the dry season than during the rainy season, three to four times more chemicals are used for the treatment of its water in the dry season than during the rainy
season for making the water more clear, he said adding that 100 kilograms of liquid chlorine gas per hour, 12 tons of alum sulphate and four tons of cold lime are used per day from January to April.
The WASA official said 32 kgs of liquid chlorine gas per hour, 4.3 tons of alum sulphate and one ton of cold lime are used per day for the purpose from May to December in the rainy season.
"As the water of the Shitalakkha contains harmful. chemicals, including human waste, dyes and other chemicals. 

it requires mixing of more quantities of chemicals for treatment," the source said adding that instead of maintaining the standard of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Bangladesh standard is followed in the plant for the purification of water. He added that in accordance with the WHO standard for water turbidity 5 NTU (Nephelometric Turbidity unit) and for Bangladesh standard 10 NTU are used in the Syedabad water treatment plant.
Md Serajuddin, project director of the Syedabad Water Treatment Plant Phase-II project, also superin- tendent engineer of Dhaka WASA, said that same chemicals would also be used in the project like that of the phase-I project for purification of water. He added that nearly 15 lakh people of Mirpur, Gulshan, Banashri, Kazipara, Sheorapara, Mohakhali and the old city would use 22.5 million litres of water supplied from the project.
It has been mentioned in the fea- sibility study of the Syedabad Water Treatment Plant-II that "Break Point Chlorination (BPC) is by for the cheapest with marginal capital and operational costs."
BPC, however, is normally not used for drinking water treatment with these levels of ammonia and organic carbon. We tested one sample of raw water for BPC. by adding 70 mg-CM (chlorine per litre) but found no reduction in the ammonia concentration.
This indicates that the organic carbon in the water constitutes a very high chlorine content and this will almost certainly form tri- halomethans and other haloforms which are carcinogenic and highly organoleptic."
Despite thin, Dhaka WASA has decided to use chlorine for water treatment. It was recently approved at its board meeting, It has been sent to the ministry concerned for approval by the purchase
committee.
According to a journal `Orthomolecular Medicine Vol. No. 2, 2000", "Long term risks of consuming chlorinated water include excessive free radical formation which accelerates aging. 

increases vulnerability to genetic mutation and cancer development, hinders cholesterols metabolism and promotes hardening of arteries. Chlorinated water appears to increase the risk of gastro-intestinal cancer over a person`s lifetime by 50 to 100 per cent. Thousands of cancer deaths were reported in North Carolina, Illinois, Wisconsin and Louisiana in the USA after the use of chlorinated water.
Chlorine in swimming pools reacts with organic matter such as sweat, urine, blood, faeces, mucus and skin cells to from more chlo- ramines. Chloroform risk can be 70 to 240 times higher in the air over indoor pools than over outdoor pools. Canadian researchers found that after an hour of swimming in a chlorinated pool, chloroform con- centrations in the swimmer`s blood ranged from 100 to 1,093 parts per billion (ppb). If the pool smells very much of chlorine, don`t go near it. So one will absorb and inhale more chlorine in a ten-minute shower than by drinking eight glasses of the
same water.
The journal also said that a public notice issued in 2000 in Washington DC, warned that a high level of bacteria in the (chlorinated, fluoridated city system) water made it unsafe for dialysis patients, AIDS patients, organ transplant patients, the elderly and infants.

The journal suggested that instead of chlorine, if the authorities use Hydrogen Peroxide and Ozone they could destroy infections, organisms and impurities in water 4,000 times better than chlorine. A 35-per cent technical grade Hydrogen Peroxide and Ozone will promote bacterial growth to break down sewage and enhance the dissolved oxygen level in discharge water entering lakes and streams. The largest water treatment plant in Europe uses potassium perman- ganate instead of chlorine in the water treatment plant for treating organic water.
Professor Dr SM Imamul Huq, chairman of the Bangladesh Council of Science and Industrial Research (BCSIR), told this reporter yesterday that chlorine is an oxidized and very harmful element for the human body. It will decay human body slowly after use.
"Organic water treatment using hydrogen per oxide or ozone is a better option but it is expensive. This system would protect human body from decay," he said adding, "So, we should go for by hydrogen peroxide or ozone based water treatment plant in future." "Such water treatment plant can be set up under public private part- nership (PPP), he opined.

Engineer Dr Golam Mostafa, chairman of Dhaka WASA, said: "Though chlorine is very much harmful for human body, it is being use for water treatment. The same chemical will also be used in the second phase of slowly Syedabad Water Treatment Plant. "We are trying to meet the water crisis at minimum costs," he said. The Saidabad Water Treatment Plant (SWTP) is supplying of 22.5 million litres of treated water to the capital`s north-south pipeline that runs from Postogola Bridge to Farm Gate, and to the east-west pipeline which supplies water to the vast area from Goran through Old Dhaka to Dhanmondi. The intake point of the Saidabad plant is located at Sharulia, Demra and 500 metres upstream from the intake point, Balu River falls into Shitalakkhya River.
This means water from both the Balu River and the Shitalakhya River is used for treatment at the Saidabad plant. But because of the water pollution both water sources are unfit to be treated through the con- ventional treatment plant, especially during the dry season.
Ammonia concentration in the Saidabad Water Treatment Plant treated water has been found to be ten times higher than the standard set by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the dry seasons between January and April.
A study by the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet), found concen- tration of diluted ammonia in SWTP treated water reaching up to 5.7 mil- ligramme (mg) per litre compared to the WHO`s 0.5 mg per litre safety
limit.
According to a study, everyday 3,500 cubic metres of waste water containing waste load of 1,850 kilo- gramme with a high level of bio- chemical oxygen demand (BOD) or the propensity to absorb oxygen from water containing organic waste, gets drained into the low lying lands of eastern Dhaka, which subsequently end up in the Balu river via Begunbari and Norai canals.