Bottled water infections

Campylobacter infects about 50,000 people a year in England and Wales, far more than better-known organisms such as salmonella. Yet until the mid-Seventies it was virtually unheard of. epidemiologist Dr Meirion Evans.

"Drinking bottled water has not previously been recognized as a risk factor. But it is biologically plausible and could explain a substantial number of infections."

Campylobacter causes stomach pains and diarrhea. But one in 1,000 sufferers develops Guillain-Barre syndrome, which can lead to total paralysis. One in 20,000 dies.

Most cases had been linked with eating undercooked chicken, or uncooked foods contaminated by raw chicken.

Scientists from the University of Wales in Cardiff investigated more than 200 cases of food poisoning.

The results, in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, reveal that up to 12 per cent of cases could be attributed to bottled water, 30 per cent to contaminated chicken and 21 per cent to salad.

The Natural Mineral Water Service said bottlers already test for campylobacter, adding that the study had failed to differentiate between mineral water from underground and spring water, which could be polluted by agricultural waste.

By Mark Prigg, Evening Standard
2 October 2004

(We suspect that people who are not cleaning their hands or the bottle tops before opening are causing this infection) So please clean the tops before drinking.

Choosing tap water over bottled water may seem like a simple choice: tap water costs much less, is safer, and often tastes just as good, if not better. Nonetheless, many people continue to buy bottled water, whether out of convenience or preference.

There are numerous environmental concerns with bottled water: the production and consumption of bottled water consumes energy, pollutes the environment, and contributes to global warming. Producing the plastic bottles uses energy and emits toxic chemicals.Transporting the bottled water across hundreds or thousands of miles spews carbon dioxide into the air, complicating our efforts to combat global climate change. And in the end, empty bottles are piling up in landfills.

Plastic bottle production in the United States annually requires about 17.6 million barrels of oil.
Worldwide bottling of water uses about 2.7 million tons of plastic each year.
About 86 percent of empty plastic water bottles in the United States land in the garbage instead of being recycled. That amounts to about two million tons of PET plastic bottles piling up in U.S. landfills each year.
Many plastic bottles of all types and sizes will be incinerated, which releases toxic byproducts such as chlorine gas and ash laden with heavy metals.
Manufacturing the 28.6 billion PET water bottles in the United States takes the equivalent of 17.6 million barrels of oil.

Bottled water also has significant social implications for communities. Not only does bottled water contribute to a global lack of drinking water, it also causes local inaccessibility to water. In privatizing water, bottling corporations limit access to an essential resource that many believe should always be public

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