Assessment of Microbial Quality of Drinking Water from Different Sources in Selected Districts of Bale Zone, Oromia Regional State, Ethiopia

Background and Objective: Safe drinking water is a vital component of human diet. Thus periodic surveillance of the quality of drinking water is critically important for monitoring its safety status. The current study was initiated to assess the microbial quality of drinking water from different sources in the selected districts. Materials and Methods: Microbial analysis of total and faecal coliforms was done using most probable number (MPN) method. Samples were collected following a simple random sampling technique and a cross-sectional study design was employed. Each of the samples were investigated in triplicate. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and ANOVA was done at 5% level of probability to investigate the statistical difference among means of contamination between the different sources and localities. Results: A maximum of 6.396±0.010 log10 CFU/mL of SPC has been recorded in water samples from Tagona River in Goba District. The highest faecal coliform and Escherichia coli contamination of 1101 and 972.800±128.200 MPN/100 mL were recorded in rivers Bamo and Tagona in Goba and Haro Wanji of Dello Mana and Bamo River, respectively, showing similar trends across the three agro-ecologies. Rivers and ponds were categorized under high to very high risk classifications. Conclusion: Thus, society, as an emergency action, should take actions like filtration, boiling and treatment with some commercially available antimicrobial agents. The government is expected to establish facilities for the supply of safe drinking water to avoid the likely health burden to be posed on society from the highly contaminated water sources.