More about making profits or providing safe drinking water? A state-of-the-art review on sachet water contamination in Nigeria

Abstract

Public health concerns on surface and groundwater contamination worldwide have increased. Sachet water contamination has also raised serious concerns across many developing countries. While previous studies attempted to address this issue, this review takes a different approach by utilizing a comprehensive analysis of physicochemical parameters, heavy metals, and microbial loads tested in sachet water across Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones, within the period of 2020–2023. In this review study, over 50 articles were carefully analyzed. Collected data unveiled regional variations in the quality of sachet water across Nigeria. Noteworthy concerns revolve around levels of pH, total hardness, magnesium, calcium, nickel, iron, lead, mercury, arsenic, and cadmium. Fecal contamination was also identified as a significant issue, with the prevalence of several pathogens like Escherichia coli, Salmonella typhi, Enterobacter cloacae, Staphylococcus aureus, and Enterococcus faecalis. The manufacturing, delivery, storage, and final sale of sachet water, as well as poor environmental hygiene, were identified as potential contamination sources. The intake of contaminated sachet water exposes the citizens to waterborne and carcinogenic diseases. While the sachet water industry keeps growing and making profits, it is apparent that improvement calls made by previous studies, regarding the quality of water produced, have not been paid serious attention.

Keywords:

• Packaged water
• public health
• heavy metals
• microbial loads
• waterborne diseases

Acknowledgement

No external funding was received for this work.

Author contributions

Conceptualization: Johnson C. Agbasi; Supervision: Johnbosco C. Egbueri, Hillary Onyeka Abugu; Literature search/methods: Johnson C. Agbasi, Ifeanyi Adolphus Ucheana; Data analysis: Arinze Longinus Ezugwu, Michael Ekuru Omeka, Visualization: Chiedozie Chukwuemeka Aralu; Original draft: Johnson C. Agbasi, Johnbosco C. Egbueri; Review, revision, writing & editing: All authors; Validation and Approval: All authors.

Data availability statement

All the data used in this paper are provided herein.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.