A new survey reveals that 55% of Americans are concerned about the quality of their tap water. The online survey, conducted by Cint on behalf of Bluewater, also revealed that approximately one in six Americans avoid drinking water direct from their kitchen taps.
The online poll surveyed more than 1,000 U.S. adults ages 18 to 70 about their general sentiments around drinking residential water and their use of different residential water filtration and purification devices in the market. Some 40.2% of respondents said they used a water pitcher filtration device to clean their tap water, while 6.4% said they utilized an under-sink, reverse osmosis water purification system.
Some 20.8% said they relied on buying bottled water in bulk to use at home to drink. Eighty-two percent believe it is vital to their health and wellbeing to have a dedicated water purifier at home to remove dangerous substances from their tap water.
“These findings are very relevant at this time as millions of Americans are living in areas with aging municipal water delivery systems or are threatened by severe water shortages that will place an extra burden on safe water supply, “ said Niclas Wullt, managing director of the Sweden-based Bluewater brand. “Our tap water and health cannot be separated because many conditions such as heart disease and cancer have been linked to contaminants regularly found in tap water.”
The U.S. Water Quality Assn. noted, “water that leaves the treatment facility can become contaminated by the time it shows up at your tap.” That view has been supported by Consumer Reports, an independent, non-profit U.S. consumer organization, which said, “dangerous contaminants such as lead, chloroform, arsenic, nitrite, radon and E.coli bacteria are common in tap water.”
The World Health Organization has reported that only about one-third of the world’s potential freshwater can be used for human needs, due to “increased pollution from municipal and industrial waste and leeching of fertilizers and pesticides in agriculture.”
“The ongoing surge in sales bottled water around the planet underlines the level of consumer fear about the quality of their tap water, despite the best efforts of public water treatment facilities, many of which were designed several decades ago and are not geared to meet today’s threats,” Wullt said.
Source: Bluewater
