Impact of human population and household latrines on groundwater contamination in Igboora Community, Ibarapa Central Local Government Area of Oyo State, South-western Nigeria

Abstract

In Nigeria, lack of good potable water has always been a major problem; hence many homes have wells as a source of water for household uses. The objectives of this study are to determine the predominant sources (human or livestock) of fecal pollution in wells and concentrations of fecal bacteria and pathogens in well water. Thirty Five samples of well water in different places in Igboora community were analyzed for Total Aerobic Bacteria Counts (TABC) and Total Coliform Counts (TCC). The location and distances of wells from latrines were determined using the Global Positioning System (GPS) device and a tape rule respectively. All the wells sampled had high mean total of TABC (5.79±0.51 log CFU/mL) and TCC (2.77±0.42 log CFU/mL) which ranged for TABC (1.40±0.16 to 9.20±0.49 log CFU/mL) and TCC (1.02±0.13 to 4.43±0.77 log CFU/mL) counts which exceeded the international standard of 0 per 100 mL of potable water. TABC increased with a decrease in distance between the wells and latrines though not significant (p<0.05). The average distance (9.21±1.77m) of wells from the latrines was below the limit (15.24 m or 50 ft) set by United State Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA). According to bacteroidales measurements, fecal contaminations in the 32 well samples were from anthropogenic source. Keywords: Water borne diseases, fecal source, E.coli, Latrine efi¬‚uent, Igboora.