More than 30million Americans are living in areas with unsafe drinking water, researchers warn.
A new study identified US counties with the most egregious water quality violations in public and private water systems are concentrated in four states: West Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Oklahoma.
This could mean water may have high levels of harmful contaminants and authorities may not be regularly monitoring water or alerting the public of potential safety issues.
Wyoming County, a rural area in southern West Virginia, had the highest number of water quality violations, meaning its water did not meet federal safety standards.
But the researchers also found water systems in Mississippi, South Dakota and Texas also repeatedly had safety violations.
This could leave residents exposed to heavy metals and harmful contaminants like lead, arsenic and pesticides, increasing the risk of long-term health conditions like developmental issues, hormonal imbalances and cancer.
The researchers also warned privately owned water facilities may be no safer than those that are publicly owned, suggesting a lack of government oversight.
The team urged policymakers to prioritize vulnerable counties like those in West Virginia and Mississippi to reduce levels of toxins and be more transparent with members of the public.
A study from researchers at the Society for Risk Analysis ranked each US county based on violations in its drinking water systems (stock image)
The above map shows the counties with the highest number of violations in its public and private water systems. Darker colors represent higher number of violations
Alex Segre Cohen, lead study author and assistant professor of science and risk communication at the University of Oregon, said: ‘Policymakers can use our findings to identify and prioritize enforcement efforts in hotspots, make improvements in infrastructure, and implement policies that ensure affordable and safe drinking water – particularly for socially vulnerable communities.
‘We found that violations and risks of water injustice tend to cluster in specific areas or hotspots across the country.’
The research comes as 2million Americans don’t have access to running water or indoor plumbing in their homes.
Another 30million live in areas with drinking water that doesn’t meet safety regulations.
Additionally, nearly one in three Americans have been exposed to water teeming with forever chemicals, synthetic chemicals that accumulate in the organs and lead to hormonal imbalances and some forms of cancer.
The study, published Tuesday in the journal Risk Analysis, compared water quality and access to safe water in public and private water systems.
The team used data on drinking water systems from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS).
About nine in 10 Americans receive drinking water from systems that report to the EPA.
The data represents reports from 2019.
Overall, public water systems reported an average of 1.9 violations per facility per year compared to 1.3 in private systems, a 38 percent difference.
This could mean water systems exceeded safe levels of contaminants like lead, hazardous materials may have been disposed of in them or toxic chemicals may have been used during the cleaning process.
Additionally, water systems on Native American reservations reported 1.6 violations per facility per year on average, 21 percent more than private systems.
Wyoming county, West Virginia, reported 4,667 violations in its public water system and 2,464 in its private system in 2019.
Boone county, West Virginia, and Mercer county, West Virginia, followed most closely behind, though the researchers did not specify how many violations they had.
Wyoming and Boone counties have about 20,000 residents each, while Mercer county boasts nearly 60,000.
Four counties in Pennsylvania ranked in the top 10 worst – Potter, Tioga, Cameron and Somerset – along with Caswell and Person counties in North Carolina.
The researchers wrote: ‘In addition to West Virginia, counties in other states, such as Arizona, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Oregon, and Washington, constituted hotspots with significantly higher numbers of water system violations.’
Lynchburg, Virginia, Florence, Wisconsin, and Sterling, Texas each had systems reporting zero violations.
Following closest behind in terms of lowest violations were three in Virginia – Danville, Craig and Henrico counties – along with Pasquotank county, North Carolina, Broomfield county, Colorado, Menard county, Texas, and Walsh county, North Dakota.
The above map represents water injustice scores for each US county. Darker colors represent higher percentiles, indicating worse water scores
The above map shows the proportion of private water systems by US county
The researchers also calculated a ‘water injustice’ score for each US county, which was based on interviews with people living in each county about how safe they felt their drinking water was.
Eight in 10 of the counties with the highest water injustice scores were located in Mississippi, with Issaquena county ranked the most at risk. Buffalo county, South Dakota and Presidio county, Texas, were also in the top 10.
The researchers said: ‘Those living in communities with higher water injustice scores were more likely, on average, to perceive their water as less accessible, lower quality, and less reliable.’
Though water systems serving the public had more violations than private ones, many of those public systems are still privately owned.
Segrè Cohen said: ‘Our results suggest that privatization alone is not a solution.
‘The local context, such as regulatory enforcement, community vulnerability, and community priorities, matters in determining outcomes.’
Instead, the researchers urged lawmakers to prioritize vulnerable counties as a whole rather than focusing only on those that are publicly owned.