Arsenic Contamination in Ground Water Sources of District Matiari, Sindh

The presence of arsenic (As) has been reported across the globe in drinking water sources, Asia being the most significantly affected area for arsenic contamination around the world. In Asia around 100 million people are at risk of arsenic contaminated water sources and more than 700,000 cases have been reported for arsenic related diseases. Many research studies have been conducted for arsenic contamination, furthermore many studies are being carried out but still there is significant lack of knowledge about the prevalence and impact of arsenic and its epidemiology in under developed countries like Pakistan. The focus of this study is on the rural areas of Sindh using ground water as major source of drinking water. In Pakistan groundwater arsenic concentration has reached up to 1100 μg/L compared with WHO limits of 10μg/L internationally and 50μg/L for Pakistan. In the province of Sindh, around 36% of the population is exposed to arsenic contamination above WHO limits. Therefore, keeping in view the catastrophic situation, a study on arsenic prevalence in the district of matiari has been conducted to identify presence of arsenic in ground water. 85 water samples were taken from district matiari from hand pumps and boring and did field analysis for salinity and total dissolved salts (TDS). Further, the samples were brought in water testing and surveillance laboratory, LUMHS, Jamshoro where samples were tested for turbidity and arsenic. Arsenic presence was tested by Merck arsenic kit for 0.00-0.5 mg/L. The concentration for arsenic was estimated by visual comparison of the reaction zone of analytical test strip with the color scale. From the total of 85 samples, 60 samples are positive for arsenic, and among those 22 samples are positive above WHO criteria for Pakistan (0.05mg/L or50μg/L). This research is part of the efforts taken to evolve and develop a community based awareness of arsenic hazards and sustainable arsenic mitigation system by establishing spatial and temporal prevalence of arsenic in the study area.