Requirement for freshwater will continue to rise significantly over the coming decades to meet the needs of increasing populations, growing economies, changing lifestyles and evolving consumption patterns. This will greatly amplify the pressure on limited natural resources and ecosystems. Unsafe water and sanitation account for almost one tenth of the global burden of disease (Fewtrell et al., 2007). Total 768 million and 2.5 billion people in the world are living without access to clean water and proper sanitation, respectively (WHO, 2002; WHO and UNICEF, 2013a). International development agencies are often urging the developing countries devote more attention to protecting and improving water quality. The developed world also must spend
Europe and America confront enormous water pollution. Over 90% of Europe's rivers have high nitrate concentrations, mostly from agrochemicals, and 5% of them have concentrations at least 200 times greater than nitrate levels that occur in unpolluted rivers (WHO, 1999). Although mineral salts of low pollution relevance are the most common constituents found in groundwater, some serious pollutants and pollution levels also can be detected. UNEP (1998) reported that 79% of groundwater samples in Sri Lanka contains nitrate levels above the drinking water standard of 10
High fluoride content is often detected from such symptoms on human beings as yellowing of teeth, damaged joints and bone deformities, which occur from long years of exposure to fluoride containing water. Due to this reason, by the time the community realises the “menace”, a large section of the population is already affected. A recent survey by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in north Gujarat showed 42 per cent of the people covered in the sample survey (28,425) were affected; while 25.7 per cent were affected by dental fluorosis, 6.2 per cent were affected by muscular skeletal fluorosis and 10 per cent by