Mayor of Galway Niall Ó Brolcháin has welcomed a promise by Minister for Environment Dick Roche to expedite €48 million in funds to tackle Galway's water pollution crisis.
However, the public health alert affecting 90,000 people in the city and part of the county is expected to last indefinitely. The Minister acknowledged in Galway yesterday that it would be "irresponsible to speculate when it will be safe".
The fast-tracking of funds to upgrade water treatment in Terryland, Galway city, and for water conservation and storage in Tuam, Co Galway, was promised as part of a 12-point plan agreed with the Minister, mayor and city and county officials at the emergency meeting in Galway.
Mr Roche and local authority officials have said they are no closer to identifying the source of the cryptosporidiosis contamination, which has been traced to human and animal faeces in the city's public water system, along with Headford, Co Galway. It has resulted in a public health alert involving some 90,000 people since March 15th.
However, it is understood that several sewage treatment plants feeding into the Corrib catchment system are suspected to have contributed to the outbreak of the parasite. This has resulted in 140 notified cases of gastro-intestinal illness since January.
Galway County Council director of services Jim Cullen denied yesterday the treatment plant at Oughterard was a possible source, and said that a "cocktail" is likely to have been responsible. The Oughterard plant was designed in 1947 for several hundred houses, and a scheduled upgrade six years ago was postponed due to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
"I'd be very surprised if it was one source and we may never find it," Mr Cullen said. Many sources, both human and agricultural, may have contributed but it would be presumptuous to state that it was simply an agricultural issue, he said.
The entire Corrib catchment was being tested for the parasite, not just water treatment works, he added.
However, a University College Cork (UCC) microbiologist has stressed that identifying the source is crucial to preventing outbreaks of other serious illnesses in the city and county.
"If public water supplies are being contaminated by sewage, either directly or from effluent from a treatment plant, this is a very serious situation," Prof Kevin Collins said. "And if the infection is now being spread person-to-person, it makes it very difficult to control as you are relying totally on the effectiveness of personal hygiene."
Prof Collins said there was a perception that sewage treatment plants rendered water safe, but even tertiary treatment plants did not produce disease-free effluent.
"The problem with these larger plants in urban areas is that they expel concentrates of certain viruses which are resistant to chlorination and other treatments," he added.
The infective cysts of cryptosporidium and giardia are resistant to chlorine, but in small-scale settings the use of coagulants (flocculants) improves chances of removal. He added that the situation highlighted the need for a national reference laboratory on cryptosporidiosis - as recommended in a National Disease Surveillance Centre report for the Department of Health, published in 2004.
Neither the department nor the HSE has been able to confirm if the report's recommendations are being implemented.
At yesterday's press briefing, Mr Roche said the contaminated Terryland water treatment plant would be phased out.
Moreover, he added, supplementary supplies for the city would be imported from the Luimnagh plant at Tuam, as confirmed last week by city and county officials.
