Chronic exposure to heavy metals in public water supply and human health risk assessment.

Etchie, Ayotunde T. and Adewuyi, Gregory O. and Etchie, Tunde O. (2012) Chronic exposure to heavy metals in public water supply and human health risk assessment. Terrestrial and Aquatic Environmental Toxicology, 6 (2). pp. 106-111. ISSN 1749-0324

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Abstract

Historic disasters resulting from heavy metals contamination of drinking water emphasis the need to assess the quality of public water supply. Currently, millions of people in and around Bangladesh are facing chronic health risk of arsenic poisoning via drinking water. Therefore, to prevent the re-occurrence of these tragic episodes, heavy metals levels in public water supply at Agodi-residential area of Ibadan were determined and health risk assessment was done for metals whose levels were detected higher than the US EPA maximum contaminant levels for drinking water. These metals are Cd, Co, Cr+6 and Mn. Sampling was spread from January to July, 2010 to account for variations in rainy and dry seasons. 10 public taps were sampled at 5 different times making a total of 50 water samples collected. Metals determination was done using atomic absorption spectrophotometry. The mean concentrations (mg/L) of Cd, Co, Cr+6 and Mn were 0.053 ± 0.019 , 0.142±0.020, 0.211±0.070 and 0.171±0.017 respectively. These values are significantly higher than the metals’ maximum contaminant levels in drinking water. Health risk assessment conducted for adult and child residents, via oral and dermal routes of exposure, using the US EPA default parameters in the absence of site specific values, gave overall hazard index values of 19.1 and 44.8 respectively, while the estimated cancer risk values were 1.5E-03 and 9E-04 respectively. These values significantly exceed the target non-cancer hazard index of 1 and target cancer risk of 1.0E-06. Hence, it was concluded that the concentration of the investigative metals in the public water supply was high enough to cause carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health effects for adults and children residing in the study area.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	carcinogenic; hazard quotient; hazard index; non-carcinogenic; evaluation
Subjects:	Q Science > Q Science (General) Q Science > QD Chemistry
Depositing User:	Dr Tunde Ogbemi Etchie
Date Deposited:	30 Nov 2018 11:21
Last Modified:	30 Nov 2018 11:21
URI:	https://eprints.lmu.edu.ng/id/eprint/1474

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