bacterial contamination levels of selected water sources in gayaza kyetume, a wakiso district

Description

Microbial pollution in aquatic environments is one of the crucial issues with regard to the sanitary state of water bodies used for drinking water supply and recreational activities due to potential contamination by pathogenic bacteria, protozoa or viruses. The analysis on the bacterial levels of contamination of the selected surface water sources in Gayaza Kyetume A Wakiso District was carried out to ascertain the variation of the bacteriological water quality of the two surface well water sources using standard microbiological techniques. The shallow well depicted a mean Total Plate Count of 9.1073×104 cfu/ml ranging from 2.49×104 to 4.62×105 cfu/ml higher than the deep well with a mean Total Plate Count of 2.799×104 cfu/ml ranging from 1.8×104 to 4.02×104 cfu/ml which exceeded the permissible limit of <5.0×102 cfu/ml as per the WHO standards. The highest mean TPC was observed in the shallow well water samples while the lowest mean TPC was observed in the deep well samples. Total coliform counts for both wells ranged from 2.0×103 cfu/ml to 8.2×104 cfu/ml and it was observed that the shallow well was more contaminated with coliforms with a mean TC of 2.026×104 cfu/ml than the deep well with 7.6×103 cfu/ml thus the highest mean TC value was recorded in shallow well samples. The highest Escherichia.coli count was registered in shallow well water at 1.42×103cfu/ml greater than the deep well with 4.667×102cfu/ml all together crossing acceptable limits. This thus implied the water was not meeting the safety requirements for human and animal consumption.