CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Following the theory of creation, it is clear that water is as old as man. From time immemorial, man has restorted to the use of this unique commodity for domestic and other purposes. Most of our water supplies are from surface water which include: rivers, streams, lakes, oceans and seas and there water bodies are likely to be polluted with domestic and Industrial as well as agriculture waste, As populations increase, the problem become more serious and as such, water can endanger the health and life of human beings because when polluted by fecal materials it becomes potential carrier of pathogenic organism (Carpenter, 1977). Water, is of course, absolutely essential to life, not only human life but all life, animal and vegetable. Most of the biochemical reaction that occur in metabolism and growth of living cells involved water, and all take places in water. (Camp et al,1974).Man uses water not only for drinking purposes but also for bathing, washing, laundering, heating, air conditioning, agriculture, stock raising and gardens, Industrial processes and cooling water power and steam8power, fire protection, fishing, swimming and wild life propagation and navigation. Natural water contain not only then natural flora but also micro – organisms from soil and possible from animals or sewage. Surface waters in streams or pools and stored waters in lakes and large ponds vary considerably in microbial content. (frazier, 1978) water is broadly divided into three types viz., surface water which include: streams, rivers, lakes seas, and oceans (Kelman et al, 1957). The ground water, well, bore hole, many people have defined the ground water in different ways: ground water is non saturated water that occurs where all pores in the soil or rock counting materials are saturated (pelezer et al, 1992). The atmospheric water, which include rainfalls. All water bodies consist of a variety of bacterial and other microorganisms like the Algaes, fungi, which inhabit these natural water bodies. Some of these micro –organisms are indigenous to thus natural water while others are transient, entering the water from external environment (Pelezar and Reg, 1997).The generality of bacteria are mostly commonly found ordinarily in fresh water some of which include: pseudomonas, Archacbacter, and vibrio these are gram negative, the gram-positive bacterial which are found in9water include: micrococcus Archacbacter and actinomycetes (Gebharal, 1975). Tap water, as one of the water sources is mostly used domestically, it is observed that tap change sometime the water tap will be clear this calls for load, in order to be sure of its portability (Bonde, 1977). The increase in drinking water from different sources especially in Enugu state has made necessary to investigate the microbial content of water. Water is a potential carried of pathogenic organisms that can endanger human life. Most of drinking water sources are often contaminated with different pollutants like faeces, animal and plant wastes, making such water unfit for drinking if not treated. The pollution of water with pathogenic organisms and other pollutants can only be detected by carrying out microbiological assessment of such water. Most human disease such as typhoid paratyphoid cholera, amobiasis, Trichinosis, gastroenteritis, salmonella shigellosis, diphtheria, giadia, dracunculus etc are known to be water borne disease. (Ewington et al, 1971).Water born disease are those disease which have water as their vehicle of transmission these disease are capable of destroying a whole community if not checked. Therefore, the quickest ways to prevent out break of these disease and to determine the portability of such water sources is to determine the microbial load or content if the microbial content is nor within acceptable limit, such water sources should be condemned immediately (Fair et al, 1970).

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