ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources (PCRWR) on Tuesday announced that eight brands of drinking bottled water have found to be unsafe due to chemical and microbiological contaminations.
These eight brands were Edlen Premium, Aqua Fine, Pure Aqua, Livon, Zam, Aqua Gold, Pure 18, and Aab-e-Noor.
PCRWR had been tasked by Ministry of Science and Technology to monitor and improve quality of bottled water through quarterly monitoring of bottled/mineral water brands and publicize the results.
According to monitoring report for quarter from January to March, 2018, 110 samples of Mineral/Bottled water brands have been collected from Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Peshawar, Multan, Lahore, Bahawalpur, Tandojam, Quetta and Karachi.
The comparison of analytical findings with permissible limits of Pakistan Standards & Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) has revealed that 08 brands (i.e. Edlen Premium, Aqua Fine, Pure Aqua, Livon, Zam, Aqua Gold, Pure 18, and Aab-e-Noor) were found to be unsafe due to chemical and microbiological contaminations.
Out of those unsafe brands, one brand (i.e. Aqua Fine) has comparatively high levels of Arsenic i.e 20 ppb than PSQCA water quality standard for arsenic (10 ppb).
The excessive level of arsenic can cause various types of skin diseases, diabetes, kidney diseases, hypertension, heart diseases, birth defects, black foot diseases and multiple types of cancers etc.
Four brands (i.e. Zam, Aqua Gold, Pure 18, and Aab-e-Noor) were found to be unsafe due to microbiological contamination which may cause Cholera, Diarrhea, Dysentery, Hepatitis, Typhoid etc.
Whereas three brands (i.e. Edlen Premium, Pure Aqua and Livon) were found unsafe due to presence of higher levels of Sodium ranging from 57-60 ppm than PSQCA water quality standard for sodium (50 ppm).
It is mentioned here that poor quality of drinking water has forced a large cross-section of citizens to buy bottled water. As a consequence of this expanding market a mushroom growth of bottled water industry in the country is witnessed during last few years.
However, many of the mineral/bottled water companies were found selling contaminated water. The detailed report can be seen on www.pcrwr.gov.pk
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