THE City of Joburg has called for calm following the new threat of a typhoid breakout.
Joburg MMC for Environment and Infrastructure Services Department, Michael Sun, said there was no need to panic. The office of the MMC said he noted with concern posts of a typhoid outbreak circulating on social media recently.
In a statement, the department said: “Joburg Water’s laboratory team extracts about 4 700 water samples from facilities such as reservoirs, outlets and waterways per month and conducts a 23 parameter test on each sample, including tests for bacteria such as Escherichia coli (E.coli) and other heavy metals.
“The parameters measured are well within the South African National Standards (Sans) for drinking water quality standards and no harmful bacteria had been detected at the Joburg Water’s potable water reservoirs in recent tests.
“Joburg Water undertakes a number of tests and the laboratory team conducts daily sampling for microbiological analysis and chemical analysis on a number of selected sampling points across the distribution network in Joburg.”
Sun said the quality of drinking water in the distribution network on determinants tested from July to December 2021 met legislated standards.
“All physical, chemical and biological health-related parameters were compliant to the Sans 241 drinking water quality standard,” Sun explained.
According to Rand Water, it has disinfection water treatment processes in place to inactivate bacteria such as Salmonella typhi. The processes include primary chlorine, secondary mono-chloramine and in certain locations, tertiary hypochlorite disinfection processes.
In a statement, Rand Water added: “Disinfection is highly effective in neutralising all bacteria. As per the requirements of the South African National Standard for drinking water, Rand Water monitors for Escherichia coli, a bacteria used to indicate the presence of other bacteria in drinking water. Compliance reports show that drinking water supplied by Rand Water complies with Sans 241.”
The National Institute for Communicable Diseases dismissed the social media posts doing the rounds regarding typhoid fever, as false information.
