Areas we work in / Ngā Wāhi Mahi

RECREATIONAL WATER

Healthy Water means Fun in the Water Community and Public Health is involved with maintaining and protecting the quality of coastal waters and freshwater waterways which are used for a range of recreational activities such as swimming, sailing, boating, surfing, water skiing, underwater diving and shellfish gathering. Maintaining and protecting the quality of recreational water is an important environmental health and resource management issue.

Water can be contaminated by human or animal excreta which may contain a range of disease causing micro-organisms such as viruses, bacteria and protozoa. Algal blooms are an additional contaminant that is appearing more frequently in our waterways. These can be blue/green in colour floating on the surface of lakes – planktonic cyanobacteria or blackish benthic mat-forming cyanobacteria clinging to rocks in rivers or collecting at the sides of rivers. Some cyanobacteria species are known to produce toxins.

Contamination may pose a health hazard when the water is used for recreational activities such as swimming and other high contact water sports. With these activities there is a reasonable risk that water will be swallowed, inhaled or come into contact with ears, nasal passages, mucous membranes or cuts in the skin, allowing pathogens or algal toxins to enter the body. In most cases the ill-health effects from exposure to contaminated water are minor and short lived, however there is the potential for more serious diseases such as hepatitis A, giardiasis, cryptosporidiosis, campylobacteriosis and salmonellosis. Further, symptoms of intoxication from toxic algae can range from allergic reactions, asthma, eye irritations, and rashes to rapid onset of nausea and diarrhoea to gastroenteritis to other specific effects such as hepatotoxicity (liver damage) and possibly carcinogenesis.

Always read the signs The local regional council (e.g. ECAN or the West Coast Regional Council) coordinates the monitoring of the various sites throughout our region. The regional council informs Community and Public Health and the territorial local authority (TLA) if contamination levels present a potential health risk. Community and Public Health are responsible for supporting the TLAs in advising the public of the risk and ensuring that the TLAs take all steps to remove the contamination. (if possible). Warning signs and media releases are used to inform the public of areas where a health risk has been identified.