Northern Health Drinking Water Program

Bruce Gaunt, Drinking Water Planner for the Northern Health Authority, provided some very interesting details regarding the availability of safe drinking water in the Northern 2/3 of the Province.  That is roughly the size of the Northern Health Authority area, although the population is much smaller that the southern area.

In this huge area, Northern Health is responsible for  overseeing approximately 1230 Water Systems, although this doesn't include the individual or personal water systems across the north.

Water Regulations were unheard of in BC until 1992, says Bruce.  Before that time, people used all sort of water wells and water systems without any control of regulation to ensure the safety of the water to the consumers.

In 2003, the Province brought in the Drinking Water Protection Act and Regulations.

It might be said that people were more comfortable not knowing the quality of the water they were using, as the more you learn about water quality and bacteria or chemicals that might be in the water, the more alarmed you might become.

Clean water has been a serious health  concern in many situations over the years, causing illness or death in many instances.

In BC, we are fortunate to have a large quantity of water without many health concerns.  However, we are also guilty of being very wasteful of water, with the average come using 250 gallons of water per day for the average 3 person family. 

Bruce was thanked by Rotarian Neil Godbout with another donation to our Polio Plus Program.