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The risks of drinking water
Author(s) -
Crouch E. A. C.,
Wilson R.,
Zeise L.
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1029/wr019i006p01359
Subject(s) - risk assessment , risk analysis (engineering) , environmental science , pollutant , estimation , water pollutants , health risk , environmental health , business , computer science , engineering , environmental chemistry , medicine , chemistry , computer security , organic chemistry , systems engineering
Exposures to the low levels of organic compounds found in drinking water might cause a variety of health effects, cancer being one of great concern. The estimation of cancer risk is uncertain, which may in part explain why cancer risk is not properly considered in establishing drinking water standards. Current standards for a given chemical or class of chemicals do not account for the presence of other pollutants, chemicals which have not been tested in long term oral bioassays are generally ignored, and the uncertainties of risk calculations are not explicitly considered. To better quantify risks from drinking waters, we apply procedures which incorporate measures of uncertainty into the risk calculation and consider all chemicals included in a water analysis. This procedure is demonstrated by calculating risks for several U.S. water supplies. Our results show that some might pose moderately high risks.