Abstract

Waterborne diseases are common and major problem in developing countries. Considering the great importance of the safety of recreational waters, a cross-sectional study at Addis Ababa and Oromiya regional state was carried out over a three month period of time from May-July, 2008. A total of 72 water samples from two natural bathing lakes and six outdoor swimming pools were collected and analyzed for total and fecal coliforms, fecal streptococci, hetrotrophic bacteria, Staphylococcus aureus, pH, temperature, free chlorine and turbidity. The study demonstrated that from all the samples analyzed for microbiological water qaulity 52(96.3%) were found to be positive for S. aureus, 44 (81.5%) for total coliforms, 43 (79.6%) for total bacteria count, and 38 (70.4%) for fecal coliforms. All of the samples from the swimming pools do not have the required level of chlorination (1.0 mg l^-1 (100%)). Moreover, 75.9% of the pool samples passed the required turbidity level and 33.3% of samples were alkaline in pH. All of the microbial analyses of the two natural bathing lakes were within guideline limit of bathing water regulations of United Kingdom. From these results it can be concluded that, except that of the natural bathing lakes, most of the bacteriological and physicochemical parameters measured from outdoor swimming pools were not in compliance with the reference values set out by WHO guideline. This is mainly due to lack of awareness, absence of monitoring, proper disinfection and/or lack of information or control over related parameters to efficient disinfection processes. The study findings suggest that the observed problems can be minimized by promoting good hygiene education and practices for swimmers, applying a better and strict supervision, providing training and education for operators, monitoring the biological and chemical conditions through guideline development of the pool at regular intervals.

Key words: Swimming pools, microbiological indicators, microbial water quality, recreational water quality.