Water Filtration Device
<optional> By: your name here
Description and Rationale
A lot of the water in the Philippines is severely polluted; the water was originally clean and many people depended off a lot of these sources of water. Now people have started throwing trash and other harmful chemicals into the water. A lot of the water was deliberately polluted and some of it was accidently polluted and now a lot of the Philippines big fresh water sources have been polluted or contaminated.
How does the polluted water affect the local ecology and fish population? Does it poison the fish and make them non-edible? Do a lot of people have to leave their homes in search of other freshwater sources? How many people die of harmful bacteria and toxins from these polluted water sources? How can people purify the water or find other water sources and purify them if they are slightly cleaner? Why do people throw their trash into the rivers when they could instead through it away into a trashcan?
Might there be cheap and efficient ways to purify the water for drinking? Recently observations in the Cambodian province show that many folk get there water from a highly polluted water source called the Mekong River were people throw their waste and other harmful things. What are the reasons for this disregard? How much of the water has been polluted and how much of the water can be purified enough to drink? If cheap purification sources are found it should help keep the sickness rate down and allow more people access to water in poor and rural areas. What would be the best way(s) to communicate the finding to the people and tribes?
The initial purpose of this project will be to research the cheapest way to purify water cheaply among poor populations that depend on a river or possibly a well, through the search of literature as well as firsthand observations and interviews with people living in these areas with these problems. These initial findings will help guide the experimental phase, where key variables in purification of waters high levels of toxins and bacteria will be explored along with cheap efficient ways of purifying fresh water.
It is hoped that cheap water purification treatments might help improve the livelihood of the people living in the tribes or squatter villages through a better understanding of clean water.
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Biology
Common Names and Synonyms
Typhoid fever also known as Enteric fever. To most people it is commonly referred to as Typhoid, since it is a shorter way of saying Typhoid fever. Other synonyms include Fiebre Tifoidea (Spain); Tipus Lagnat (Philippines); and Febbre tifoide (Italy).
Classification
Kingdom: Eubacteria
Phylum: Proteobacteria
Class: Gamma Proteobacteria
Order: Enterobacteriales (rod-shaped)
Family: Enterobacteriaceae (rod-shaped)
Genus: Salmonella
Species: S. enteric
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Morphology and Physical Description
Typhoid is a very small microscopic bacterium that is round and has smooth edges. The typhoid bacterium also has flagella to help it maneuver.
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Getting Food
The bacterium sends out enzymes that digest the nutrients and food materials. After that the bacteria pretty much absorb the food through the skin. This is how bacteria get their food.
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Reproduction
Because typhoid comes from the bacteria salmonella enterica it reproduces through mitosis. Mitosis is when the organism, in this case bacterium, is when it splits into two and creates a whole new bacterium.
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Environmental Factors
The typhoid bacterium thrives most in hot climates mainly consisting around 90 to 99 degrees Fahrenheit. The bacterium doesn’t live in cold places like Canada and Russia. The bacterium also thrives in high altitude. When the temperature is high it helps allow the bacterium to survive longer.
Many governments have help get rid of the bacteria by increasing the amount of money going into keeping cities clean and by making health inspectors become stricter on what to look for. The sewer systems in these countries are cleaned and all the water is purified to keep the harmful bacteria level down. In the United States alone they have virtually gotten rid of all the typhoid fever and the minute cases that do happen, happen when people go to other countries like Mexico.
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Origin and Distribution
The oldest record of typhoid fever was in 430 – 426 A.D. in Athens, Greece which was a devastating plague that wiped out one third of the population of Athens. Typhoid can now be found almost in every country in the world. Huge out breaks have been reported in every country in south and Central America and in all of Africa and 93% of all Asian countries have fallen victim to typhoid.
Typhoid is found in the Philippines because of the Spanish explorers that inhabited the Philippines. When they came they brought the typhoid bacterium with them.
Typhoid fever is passed through the feces of an infected animal or human. Typhoid is mostly found in poor 3rd world countries because of their low hygiene and because of the way they get rid of their waste. One of the big problems is when the feces of a person ends up in the water this happens when the feces starts to seep through the soil after its been buried into the water where is contaminates it.
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Transmission
The number one cause of transmission of Typhoid is from flying insects that feed on feces. The fly is the number one spreader of Typhoid fever. Most flies will feed on feces and then fly to another food source where they transmit the bacteria which may be consumed by a person. There also have been many cases of the bacteria being transmitted by touching water fountains and other public facilities. The bacteria is transmitted this way by people who do not wash their hands after using the bathroom.
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Survivability and Endangered Status
Typhoid has lasted as long as it has because of its survivability rate and because of how contagious it is. In poor 3rd world countries there are huge typhoid breakouts all the time because there is no sanitation in those countries. Another problem is that the bacterium also lives for a long time. Its average life span outside of the human body is over a week or two.
Humans can also carry the bacterium inside them without even noticing. Sometimes the bacterium will live inside the hosts’ gallbladder and lay eggs and the host won’t realize it because he/she will not experience any major symptoms.
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Potential Solutions
How bad is water pollution in the Philippines? The Philippines has around 80 million people living in it and only has a few water sources for that huge population. Only 36% of the countries water sources I considered clean enough to drink. That leaves 74% of the water is classified as undrinkable and most of the country’s poor and impoverished cant afford the government or the cities clean water. Studies were done in the Philippines to see what percentage of sicknesses was caused by water born diseases and they found that 31% of all sicknesses are caused by water born diseases. The country is even losing money because of the pollution in the rivers and waters. The government loses around 1.3 billion pesos a year to damages that are caused by these problems.
Possibility 1 -
: The LifeStraw
On vestergaard-frandsen.com I found some water purifiers that looked very useful and easy to use. The article talks about how the life straw has been purchased by aid companies and sent all around the world. They have been proven to be very successful.
Advantages:
1.The life straw is extremely cheap and efficient. It only costs a total of 2 dollars per life straw and on average people spend around 1000 pesos a month on their water bills.
2. The life straw has proven to be very successful in getting out dangerous and harmful bacterium. It gets rid of around 99% of all bacteria and harmful organisms in the water.
Disadvantages:
1. Even though the Life straw is very cheap, it still costs allot of money to ship the life straw over from the States to the Philippines.
2. If the water has been contaminated with fecal matter it will still leave the taste of the fesses in the water.
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Possibility 2 -
: Get the Word Out
My second possibility I thought about raising awareness on the subject by going out and telling people about the dangers of water pollution. One of the big problems here in the philipines is that the people don’t care about the pollution in the water and don expect it to make them sick. Many philipinos will just drink water from a non flowing stream or a stream down river from a dump.
Advantages:
1. It helps get awareness out there. It lets people know that they are putting themselves as well as other health’s at risk when they drink or give water to other people.
2. People start taking precautions and start to boil their water to get rid of a lot of the bacterium growing in their water
Disadvantages
1. It doesn’t really fix the problem. It makes the people more aware but the water is still bad. Someone who hadent heard could still drink out of the polluted water without realizing it was polluted.
2. It can make life harder on the people because it will force people to move out of their homes to find better water sources which can become very stressful and costly
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Possibility 3 -
Homemade Water Filters and Spreading the Word
I finally decided that the best thing I could do was to teach the people of the Philippines a cheap and effective way of purifying water. I looked on the internet for a web site to give me instructions on how to build a homemade water purifier. On the website howstuffworks.com I found a way to make a cheap homemade water purifier.
After you run it through the water purifier a few time you’re still supposed to boil the water to get rid of all the bacterium that wasn’t removed from the filter.
After this I went out into poor areas for example I went to the squatter village near the school and handed out instructions on how to make this filter and I also educated them about the hazards of water pollution and how it can be very harmful. I also went to a market and handed out brochures to people and told the people about the growing problem of water pollution in the Philippines.
Advantages:
1. The purifier can help out the poorer community on water pollution by cutting down on the total number of sick and deaths caused by polluted water in the areas that don’t have cleaned water sources.
2. When I told the people about the dangers of polluted water it helped spread the word about what was going on in the Philippines water supply. People will care more about where they are getting their water from.
Disadvantages:
1. Even though people know more about the problem it most likely won’t solve the root of the problem which is the pumping of harmful chemicals and waste into these streams and underground rivers.
2. People are still at risk of drinking polluted water because the pollution is at such a high scale all across the Philippines. No matter how much I try I won’t have the resources to tell everyone about the risks and dangers they are putting themselves through without even realizing.
Possible Future Directions:
The best bet to really put the whole water pollution problem out there would be to let the government know how bad it is getting. Another good thing that you could do is to start building homemade water filters for families so they can filter out their water and drink clean unpolluted water. If the government doesn’t work then the next best step is to talk to a Aid company or a mission and tell them about the Lifestraw because if we can get someone who has the financial capability to meet the needs we can by hundreds of Lifestraws and each of them will last about a year before you need a new one.
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Bibliography
Fernandez, John. "Philippines." State of water: Philippines. 3 Sept. 1999. WEPA. 12 May 2009 <http://www.wepa-db.net/policies/state/philippines/overview.htm>.
Hamilton, Aurthur. "Water pollution in the philippines." Dw-world.de. 1 Apr. 2006. Dw-world. 12 May 2009 <http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2145647,00.html>.
Louis, Edward. "Common sense environment." Csshome.com. 24 May 1999. Csshome. 12 May 2009 <http://www.csshome.com/WaterMarine.htm>.
Peterson, David. "Philippines." Irc.nl. 30 Mar. 2001. IRC. 12 May 2009 <http://www.irc.nl/page/23965>.
Sanders, Ted. "Southeast asia." Outreachasia.org. 3 Aug. 2000. Outreachasia. 12 May 2009 <http://www.outreachasia.org/?gclid=CIa02_TttpoCFRFMagodc0hcbg>.
Smith, William. "Life Straw." Vestergaard-frandsen.com. 3 Mar. 2004. Vestgaard. 12 May 2009 <http://www.vestergaard-frandsen.com/vestergaard-frandsen.htm>.
Villanueva, Mark. "Farm chemicals in water supply." Pinoypress.net. 12 May 2002. Pinoypress. 12 May 2009 <http://www.pinoypress.net/2008/02/03/farm-chemicals-a-major-source-of-water-pollution-in-philippines-greenpeace/>.
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