Abstract

A wide range of water quality parameters were measured from different water sources in the Konongo Odumasi Municipality. Physicochemical parameters were within the World Health Organization’s recommended limits for drinking water except turbidity. Values  ranged from 66.4 to 360 mg/L; 111.1 to 603 µS/cm; 7.02 to 8.04; 4.4 to 40.2 mg/L; 1.25 to 7.07 mg/L and 4.5 to 370 NTU for total dissolve solids, conductivity, pH, sulfate, nitrate and turbidity respectively. Non-cancer human health risk assessment from exposure to Cd, Cu, Pb and Hg by resident children and adults from different water sources were also measured in accordance with the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s Human Health Risk Assessment guidelines. Cd ranged from 0.03 to 0.06 mg/L, Cu (0.02 to 3.5 mg/L), Pb (0.27 to 0.4 mg/L) and Hg (0.01 to 0.03 mg/L). Generally groundwater in the study area recorded hazard quotient (HQ) greater than 1. This implies that resident children and adults were at risk to non-cancer health diseases from consumption of groundwater. Hazard quotients (HQs) for surface water were however lower than 1, indicating low non-cancer human health risk.

Key words: Non-cancerous, risk assessment, Cadmium, Copper, Lead, Mercury, surface water, ground water, small scale mining, Konongo-Odumasi, Ghana.