When schools lack clean water

(Baonghean) - Clean water safety is very important to the health of students in schools. However, in reality, this issue still has many shortcomings...

Scarcity of clean water

Chau Thai Kindergarten is one of the disadvantaged schools, located in area 135 of Quy Hop district. Located in a dry, hot area, the school suffers from severe water shortages for more than half of the school year.

This April, the water shortage became even more severe because all the wells in the school were dry. In this urgent situation, the only solution the school came up with was to mobilize teachers and parents to bring a can of water to school every day for the children to use. In addition, teachers had to go to families in Tam Thanh village to ask for water for cooking and daily activities for the students. But currently, most of the wells in families are also dry. Truong Thi Nu, a parent with two children studying at the school, said: Every morning, my husband and I have to wake up very early, pour out buckets of water to have enough for two cans to bring to school. It's very hard, but if we don't bring water, where will we get water for the children at school?

Parents of Chau Thai Kindergarten (Quy Hop) bring domestic water to school.

Ms. Vu Thi Duyen - Vice Principal of the school said: 3/3 schools are seriously lacking clean water. The school has also considered digging wells, but due to the high terrain and many rocky mountains, the cost of digging wells is 10 times higher than other places... Without clean water, ensuring a water source for students' study and daily activities is difficult; the school also finds it difficult to control the quality of the water that parents bring every day. The most feasible solution is to buy a water purifier, but with more than 400 students (divided into 3 schools), a small capacity water purifier (for households) means that the amount of clean water treated is certainly very small.

The scarcity of clean water also occurs in many other schools in the communes of Van Loi, Minh Hop, Tam Hop and the Sang Le intersection area... Mr. Ho Binh Minh - Head of the Department of Education and Training of Quy Hop district said: Due to the geological characteristics, having enough clean water for schools in the area is extremely difficult. The district also has solutions to overcome some "hot spots"; the rest still depends on the process of mobilizing socialization of schools and parents.

Lack of clean water in the dry season is also common in mountainous districts such as Tuong Duong, Ky Son, Quy Chau, Que Phong. According to estimates, about 25% of schools do not have enough clean water to use or the water is acidic. Tuong Duong district currently has 59 schools and school sites where students have to provide their own drinking water every day, Anh Son district has 6 schools, Ky Son district has 18 schools... According to Ms. Vi Thi Bich Thuy - Head of the Department of Education and Training of Tuong Duong district, providing clean water for students in mountainous areas is difficult because the natural water supply is unstable, and tap water is only available in the central area. Remote areas due to fragmented terrain and many isolated schools do not have the conditions to invest in water treatment systems...

Quality concerns

According to Mr. Nguyen Dinh Thai - Deputy Chief of Office, in charge of school health of the Department of Education and Training, currently, students in the province use drinking water every day in the following forms: boiled water cooked by the family, provided by the family for their children, or purified bottled water or using a water filtration system. The main problem now is that the department has not yet evaluated and tested the quality of filtered water through water filters or purified water pre-packaged in bottles. Meanwhile, the number of schools using this water source is increasing with 872 schools at preschool, primary, secondary and 184 high schools - nearly 3 times higher than the remaining forms.

According to the actual situation at Hung Loc Primary School (Vinh City), the above concern is completely justified. Hung Loc Primary School signed a contract with Hai Ha Investment, Trade and Service Production Joint Stock Company (Dong Vinh Industrial Park, Vinh City) in January 2013 to invest in the school drinking water station project. According to teacher Nguyen Van Hoa, Principal of the school, during the signing process, the school did not have to spend any money. However, the school will collect fees to recover the investment capital according to the actual number of students of the school within 7 years to refund the company.

Students of Hung Loc Primary School (Vinh City) drink water treated with a filter.

Since the pure water filtration station was put into use, the school has been completely assured of the quality because, according to the company, the water filtration system provided by the company is very safe thanks to the use of RO reverse osmosis technology - USA. However, the school board does not know the actual quality of the machine's operation, because the machine is placed on the roof of the 2nd floor and is completely covered. Whenever there is a problem, the factory staff will come directly to check.

It is known that after nearly 3 years of signing the contract, the water purifier supplier has increased the water price 3 times from 11,000 - 11,500 VND and now it is 15,000 VND/student/month. However, from 2013 to now, the company has only provided the test results of clean water indicators to the school once. Meanwhile, according to regulations, at least once every 6 months, companies must collect samples and test water sources according to regulations...

Mr. Dao Trong Dung - Head of the Food Safety and Hygiene Department expressed concern: In fact, there are currently many companies coming to schools to ask to install water filtration systems. However, the inspection of water quality is not yet controlled. This, in the long run, will lead to many consequences, directly affecting the health of students.

To rectify this situation, Nghe An Department of Health has just issued a document requesting coordination between the health sector and the education sector to review and count all schools in the area that use clean water treatment lines or filters to provide drinking water for students. On that basis, there are solutions to manage the suppliers, avoiding the current situation of not knowing the quality of water filtration equipment in schools.

My Ha