USA Drinking Water Safe – Mostly

Virginia Tech’s Marc Edwards and others have identified  a ‘gap to the tap’ water safety issue in the USA.  While most tap water is supplied in a good state from supplies and treatment facilities to individual houses, the responsibilities of local and federal regulators stop outside the house.  Virginia Tech and EPA studies have shown that “there are isolated problems due to: harmful bacteria which can grow in home plumbing; leaching of lead, copper and plastic constituents from home plumbing hardware; and even human error, when a clean water line can accidentally be connected to contaminated water lines."  New research is looking specifically at the problem of lead in school drinking water supplies and how to provide adequate testing for it.
Source: http://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=116497&WT.mc_id=USNSF_1