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268 CHAPTER 10 Freshwater Resources and Water Pollution

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Bathing and washing clothes in the Ganges River are common

practices in India. The river is contaminated by raw sewage

discharged directly into the river at many different locations.

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Armed police officers in Liuzhou, Guangxi, wear protective suits

as they pour neutralizers into a hydropower station’s water tank,

to dilute cadmium contamination in the Longjiang River caused

by a major spill in January 2012. The industrial release had

threatened the water supply of tens of millions of people.

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According to the World Health Organization, nearly 800

million people don’t have access to safe drinking water,

and about 2.5 billion people don’t have access to ade-

quate sanitation systems; most of these people live in ru-

ral areas of developing countries. Worldwide, at least 250

million cases of water-related illnesses occur each year,

with 5 million or more of these resulting in death—1.8

million from diarrheal illnesses alone.

Municipal water pollution from sewage is a greater

problem in developing countries, many of which lack

w ater treatment facilities, than in highly developed

n ations. Sewage from many densely populated cities in

Asia, Latin America, and Africa is dumped directly into

rivers or coastal harbors. Other major sources of water

pollution in developing countries include industrial

wastes, agricultural chemicals, and even human remains.

The Ganges River is a holy river that symbolizes the

spirituality and culture of the Indian people. Widely used

for bathing and washing clothes (ˆ}ÕÀiÊ £ä°ÓÎ), the

river is highly polluted, largely with the mostly untreated

sewage and industrial waste produced by the 400 mil-

lion people who live in the Ganges River Basin. Another

major source of contamination is the ashes of 35,000 hu-

man bodies cremated annually in accordance with Hindu

tradition. Incompletely burned bodies are dumped into

the Ganges, and their decomposition adds to the river’s

BOD. In addition, people who cannot afford cremation

costs for their dead dump human remains into the river.

Government efforts to clean up the Ganges have yet to

produce noticeable improvements.

China’s rapidly developing economy has resulted

in such severe water pollution that many of its densely

crowded cities face water safety issues, and toxic spills

into lakes and waterways are on the rise (ˆ}ÕÀiÊ£ä°Ó{).

Providing safe drinking water for China’s 1.3 billion

people is a formidable task, even without taking into

account the current increase in water pollution.

1. How is most drinking water purified in the
   United States?


2. What are the stages in municipal sewage
   treatment? What happens in each stage?


3. How has the Safe Drinking Water Act affected
   U.S. water supplies? How has the Clean Water
   Act affected them?