Bathing Water Quality Monitoring Practices in Europe and the United States

Ananda Tiwari, David M. Oliver, Aaron Bivins, Samendra P. Sherchan and Tarja Pitkänen
Additional contact information
Ananda Tiwari: Expert Microbiology Unit, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, P.O. Box 95, FI-70701 Kuopio, Finland
David M. Oliver: Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK
Aaron Bivins: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering & Earth Science, University of Notre Dame, 156 Fitzpatrick Hall, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA
Samendra P. Sherchan: Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Tulane University, 1440 Canal Street, New Orleans, LA 70112, USA
Tarja Pitkänen: Expert Microbiology Unit, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, P.O. Box 95, FI-70701 Kuopio, Finland

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 11, 1-15

Abstract: Many countries including EU Member States (EUMS) and the United States (U.S.) regularly monitor the microbial quality of bathing water to protect public health. This study comprehensively evaluates the EU bathing water directive (BWD) and the U.S. recreational water quality criteria (RWQC) as regulatory frameworks for monitoring microbial quality of bathing water. The major differences between these two regulatory frameworks are the provision of bathing water profiles, classification of bathing sites based on the pollution level, variations in the sampling frequency, accepted probable illness risk, epidemiological studies conducted during the development of guideline values, and monitoring methods. There are also similarities between the two approaches given that both enumerate viable fecal indicator bacteria (FIB) as an index of the potential risk to human health in bathing water and accept such risk up to a certain level. However, enumeration of FIB using methods outlined within these current regulatory frameworks does not consider the source of contamination nor variation in inactivation rates of enteric microbes in different ecological contexts, which is dependent on factors such as temperature, solar radiation, and salinity in various climatic regions within their geographical areas. A comprehensive “tool-box approach”, i.e., coupling of FIB and viral pathogen indicators with microbial source tracking for regulatory purposes, offers potential for delivering improved understanding to better protect the health of bathers.

Keywords: bathing and recreational water; microbial quality; tool-box-approach; bathing water directive; recreational water quality criteria (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/11/5513/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/11/5513/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:11:p:5513-:d:559245

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().